Marianne Talbot Money. It’s always a problem isn’t it? It’s not usually, though, a case of having too much. But currently that’s my problem.
It started when the Council granted me direct payments backdated to November 2nd. Since being told I would be getting them I hadn’t dared actually spend anything. Well, would you have believed it?
But there it was – nearly £6,000 representing £403 per week for some months.
But I have now taken on board the strings it comes with.
I only get that amount, for example, if I use agency care. If I use private carers the amount reduces to just over £200. This means I can only pay private carers about £8 an hour. This is reasonable, but it isn’t riches.
And if I use private carers I must become an employer. This involves my having to pay tax and national insurance for the carer. It also involves contracts, official paid holidays, health and safety, and employers’ insurance. I am assured it is simple, but it is nevertheless daunting (and I really don’t need more to do).
A particular nuisance is that I can’t pay relatives’ expenses without having to pay tax and national insurance on them. If my sister drives from Leeds for example and I pay her petrol, then I must declare her ‘earnings’ to the inland revenue, pay her stamp and so on.
But she’s retired and doesn’t pay tax. So she has to claim this money back. What a palaver.
Then there’s the fact that the money can only be used for mum’s care. I think this means that I can’t use it for a cleaner. Yet this would be seriously useful – as mum’s incontinence gets worse I am constantly having to clean, but I never have time to do things like vacumn the sitting room, dust the bookshelves, or wash the kitchen floor.
Finally, if I do not use the money, it gets clawed back. So I might lose all the money that built up before the first payment arrived! I might even lose the money that built up over the last few dreadful weeks (when I had to cancel all the care I had set up to get mum stabilised – see my last few blogs).
One solution would be to go away for a couple of weeks. But how can I do this before I have in place one or two carers mum is happy with? She’d be happy with one of my brothers or my sister, of course, but they don’t find it easy to get away at short notice.
Still, as problems go, it’s one I’d far rather have than some others I can think of!