My father has recently passed away away. He was only wage earner as my mother cannot work due to disablities she has applied for council tax benefit, housing benefit, incapacity benefit, widow's allowance and income support.

Not sure of your Mothers actual disability, but she may qualify for Disability living allowance and that is not means tested, along with Incapacity benefit. So savings do not affect these at all, could be worth claiming DLA ? the worst they can do is say she's not entitled.

Hi Amckee - First of all my condolences for your loss.

I don't think there's much I can add to comments posted by Cat. My overall advice would be to seek advice from your local government in terms of where you stand on capacity benefits and the options available to you.

In regard the debt it's a bit of a grey area. If the debt is un-secured and taken in your fathers name alone it's difficult for the lender to tie a financial link to your mother. Alot of lenders will right off this sort of debt, but there's no legal reason why they should, so it will depend on the individual provider. Again the best thing you can do is pick up the phone and explain the situation. They will ask for a copy of the death certificate and then agree an appropriate action. Make sure you tell them your father was the only wage earner.

Please get in touch if you need any further advice having spoken with them.

Thanks,
Paul

Incapacity benefit is not means tested but i suspect that the others are, so yes, in all likelyhood, you will find that some of her benefits stop until her funds drop below the current limits.

There isn't any way, I suspect, that you can hide the money, and if she spent a lot of it in a short space of time, she would find that the benefits agency would take a dim view.

However, did your father leave a will? It may be that not all of the money is intended for her - maybe some is due to you?

As for his debts, it is possible but not usual for lenders to make a claim on the estate.

I am sorry to hear of your loss.

Cat

My father has recently passed away away. He was only wage earner as my mother cannot work due to disablities she has applied for council tax benefit, housing benefit, incapacity benefit, widow's allowance and income support.

We have found out since then that she is to receive my late father life assurance of between £26,000-£32,000.

Will this affect receiving the above benefits? As I know you are not allowed to have savings of £16,000 when appling for these benefits.

If yes, is there away of getting around it so that she is still entitled to get benefits e.g giving money to family or put the money into a special fund/account?

My late father also had some debts in his name that were not covered by payment protection will my mother have to pay the debt off out of the life assurance money as there is no other savings or estate, or does the debt die when the borrower has passed away?