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Scottish Child Payment

Qualifying benefits for Scottish Child Payment

For a client or their partner to be eligible for Scottish Child Payment, they must receive one or more of the following benefits:

  • Universal Credit
  • Income Support
  • Pension Credit
  • Job Seeker's Allowance (income based)
  • Employment Support Allowance (income related)

If a client under 16 applies for Scottish Child Payment, they may not have one of these benefits. Their application will be referred to the Decision Support Team.

A client can apply for Scottish Child Payment before the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) approves their application for a qualifying benefit. We must wait until they award the qualifying benefit before we can process their application.

The client must be awarded the qualifying benefit within 14 days of the Scottish Child Payment application being made.

If a client references a benefit from a European Economic Area (EEA) or Switzerland as their qualifying benefit, the Decision Support Team needs to be notified.

Action to take if the applicant has declared a partner

A client may make an application where they are receiving a qualifying benefit with their partner.

If the qualifying benefit is one of the following, these are seen as joint claims and the applicant will meet the qualifying benefit eligibility with no more checks required:

  • Universal Credit
  • Job Seekers Allowance (income based)

If the qualifying benefit is one of the following, then we must make further checks:

  • Employment Support Allowance (Income Related)
  • Income Support
  • Pension Credit

This is because these benefits are applied for by an individual but they may have a person named as their partner.

This means we need to check that the Scottish Child Payment applicant is the eligible person for the benefit payment.

Check for a pending qualifying benefit

Some clients may have applied for Scottish Child Payment while waiting for a decision about a qualifying benefit application. We must check this if the client is not already receiving a qualifying benefit.

Client reports that they have a zero qualifying benefit award

If the client notifies us that they have a zero award due to a sanction or deductions for liabilities, they do not have to provide evidence as the DWP will verify this information.

Record a qualifying benefit award on the system

The client will tell us on their application which qualifying benefit they’re getting, or if they do not know.

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