Care and support

Residence orders

If informal carers (sometimes known as kinship carers) take out a residence order for a child who is not ‘looked-after’, CSF can pay them a discretionary residence order allowance. However, most of each residence order allowance payment counts as income when any means-tested benefits are claimed, so it is best to seek advice before agreeing to payment this way instead of under Section 17 (see next section).

However, residence order allowances do not count as income when calculating WTC or CTC. Children and young people who are living with people receiving a residence order allowance are considered, for benefit purposes, to be members of the family. Families will therefore be entitled to claim additional benefits for the child, such as child benefit and child tax credit and can include the child in any housing and council tax benefit claim.