karlos138

Hi folks! After hours trawling various UK governmental websites regarding our proposed return to the UK and not getting any straight answers I trust someone out there can help:
I'm British, my wife Spanish.

*Do we have to register anywhere as a married couple on arrival for legal reasons?

*Though it's not her intention, will she be able to claim benefits on arrival such as tax credits, job seekers allowance etc or does she have to have been living there for a minimum length of time?

*Do our children (born in Spain) have to be registered anywhere?

Thank you very much

cinelight

Hi, I believe she will first need an NI number.

JSA, not sure, if she is claiming equivalent in Spain and still has time left on that might be able to claim JSA.

Otherwise, I think it would be means tested JSA, which means nada if you have more than £6000 in savings.

I believe children don't get an NI before being 16 years old.

You'll need to go to jobcentre on arrival to check.

I found direct.gov.uk pretty useful.

If anyone has any other feedback I'll be curious to read it ?

formula

You/she, can transfer your/her benefits from Spain. She won't get income based JSA from the UK as your salary will be included in the calculations and if she hasn't paid into the UK system for the last 2 tax years, then she can't have contribution based JSA.

Tax Credits you may get, but these will be discontinued next year and be replaced by Universal Credit; which means that most income based welfare payments for working age people (state retirement age is now moved up to age 66 and will increase to 68) will now be under 1 payment. Universal Credit has many new conditions for claimants. i.e. working for welfare payments to pay society back. Numerous other new rules for other welfare payments too, to cut the welfare bill i.e. regular medicals for those who claim for sick payments; both parties to be over retirement age for Pension Credit instead of just one of them having to be that age now

It's lucky that it isn't your intention to claim benefits as with the UK's 1 trillion pounds of debt, there seems to be plans to cut another 10 billion off the welfare bill and more changes to the way welfare is paid i.e. talk of vouchers instead of cash; limiting the number of children that can be claimed for on welfare.

Whatever government get into power in the UK, they will have to make these cuts to the ever growing welfare bill, to avoid losing out AAA rating (cheapest interest rates on our 1 trillion debts). Cameron has already said that of the 66(?) welfare payments, only the state pension will be protected. That doesn't mean that the retired won't have to do their bit too to tackle the national debt, as many claim other welfare payments too i.e. travel pass, housing, pension credit; but that only the state pension has been ring-fenced.

karlos138

Thanks a lot for the handy information! Transfering benefits from spain is a no-goer. Until last month my wife was self-employed and was informed soon after that she was ineligable for unemployment benefits. In this at times unfathomable country,those who have been self-employed for over 6 years lose the right to claim unemployment benefits in the event of closing their business. A total kick in the teeth as she had been working to help our local community for the last 7 years. In my case I have been working on average 10 months every year for the last 8 years for the same company. The months I am out of work I need to claim benefits to get by. The system here works something like: work 12 months, get 3 months dole time accumulated. This year due to the huge reductions in the company's production I will be finishing a lot earlier than I'd anticipated and should I decide to claim benefits I'll end up having to claim all that has been accumulated. A total mess basically.
Fingers crossed we'll both find work or at least have a good idea about where to find some, before arriving back in the UK.

cinelight

More info on the universal credit:

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/policy/welfare...versal-credit/

and in a sprit of looking up, your wife is most probably bilingual so that should help for work in the UK.

If only, to start with, in call centres etc

My 2 pence, all countries nowadays have massive, unfathomable debts, we're all in this together, not just the UK