Carers' Allowance and full time education

You will not be awarded Carers' Allowance if you spend more than 21 hours per week in attending a course of education at either a university, college, school or other educational establishment.

The regulations state that "In calculating the hours of attendance-

• there shall be included the time spent receiving instruction, undertaking supervised study, examination or practical work or taking part in any exercise, experiment or project, for which provision is made in the curriculum of the course and
• there shall be excluded any time occupied by meal breaks or spent on unsupervised study, whether undertaken on or off the premises of the educational establishment."

Applicants who are in education should ask their establishment to provide a written statement confirming that their course does not require as much as much as 21 hours' participation each week.

The Decision Makers' Guide points out that people are treated as attending for the usual hours each week during any vacation or temporary interruption.

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