Carer's Allowance and Hospital Stays: Break in Care Rules

The Standard Break Rule: 4 Weeks in 26

You do not lose Carer's Allowance the moment you stop providing 35 hours of care. DWP allows temporary breaks of up to 4 weeks in any rolling 26-week period without affecting your award. During those break weeks, Carer's Allowance continues to be paid even though you are not actively caring.

This covers short-term situations: a week's holiday, a few days when the person you look after is staying with another family member, or a short hospital admission for either of you.

The 26-week period is rolling, not a fixed calendar block. DWP looks back over the previous 26 weeks and counts how many weeks you were not providing 35 hours of care.

Extended Break: 12 Weeks for Hospital or Institutional Stays

If the break is caused by either you or the person you care for being in hospital (or a similar institution), the allowable break extends to up to 12 weeks in a 26-week period. This extension applies when:

• The break is temporary
• You met the 35-hour caring test for at least 14 of the preceding 26 weeks
• You would have met it for at least 22 of those 26 weeks but for the hospital or institutional stay
• At least 8 of the 12 break weeks are weeks when you or the person you care for is an in-patient

In practice, this means a carer whose relative has a long hospital admission can keep receiving Carer's Allowance for up to 12 weeks, provided their earlier caring pattern was established.

What Happens to the Cared-For Person's Disability Benefit

Hospital stays also affect the cared-for person's disability benefit, which is the qualifying condition for your Carer's Allowance. When someone is in hospital for more than 28 days, their Attendance Allowance or DLA care component usually stops, and PIP can also be affected after 28 days. If their qualifying disability benefit stops, your Carer's Allowance stops at the same time because the qualifying condition is no longer met.

The 28-day rule has nuances: it applies to NHS-funded hospital stays, and two admissions separated by fewer than 29 days at home are linked and treated as one continuous stay. Privately funded hospital care is treated differently.

Respite Care and Short Breaks

If the person you look after goes into a residential care home for a short respite stay — funded by the local authority or by the NHS — the same break rules apply. Your Carer's Allowance continues for up to 4 weeks (or 12 weeks if the hospital/institutional extension applies).

If the person enters residential care permanently, their qualifying disability benefit will usually stop within 28 days if the stay is publicly funded. When their benefit stops, your Carer's Allowance stops too. If the person pays for the care home themselves, their disability benefit may continue, which means your Carer's Allowance can also continue — though you would need to be providing 35 hours of care per week from outside the care home, which is difficult to sustain.

Reporting a Break

You must report any break in care to the Carer's Allowance Unit (or the Department for Communities in Northern Ireland). Failing to report can lead to an overpayment if DWP later discovers you were paid for weeks when you were not eligible.

Report through the GOV.UK change of circumstances service, by phone to the Carer's Allowance Unit, or through the NIDirect service in Northern Ireland.

Our Carer's Allowance Claim Guide includes a change-reporting log and explains exactly which breaks you need to report and which are covered by the standard 4-week allowance, so you know where you stand before contacting DWP.

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