Moving from Illness Benefit to Disability Pension

What is the procedure for moving from Illness Benefit to Disability Pension?

The situation is that a close relative became ill just a year ago and has been on Illness Benefit now for 11 months. He had been in full-time employment for the past 30 years up to the time of his illness in December 2008 and has a complete history of paid PRSI contributions up to that time.

His doctor has now informed him that it is most likely that he will never be fit to return to work again as his condition has worstened, therefore he now wants to make a claim for Invalidity Pension. Is it necessary to have paid PRSI contributions for the relative year in order to make a claim (as if he waits until the New Year to make a claim he would have zero paid contributions as he has not worked this year) or is it just a straight switch-over.

Also , can he continue on Illness Benefit (monthly certs from his doc) while his Disability Pension claim is pending?

It's not necessary to have paid contributions in the last complete tax year - the contributions can be either paid or credited. Most people applying for Invalidity Pension would be applying on the basis of their credited contributions given the fact that it is usual to be claiming Illness Benefit for at least 12 months before their claim.

When claiming Illness Benefit your relative will have been receiving credited contributions, so there is no need for them to worry on that score.

My advice would be to wait until they have been in receipt of Illness Benefit for 12 months & then go ahead & apply for Invalidity Pension, although in reality, given the fact that their GP has said that they will probably not be able to work again, they could actually apply now, but there is no need to worry about the contributions.

Either way the process will usually take some time, but the transition is fairly streamlined & there will be no disruption to his/her payments, & your relative should continue to claim Illness Benefit until his Invalidity Pension comes through. They will be informed of when to stop sending in the certs as soon as the application is approved & ready to be paid.

If your relative is aged 60 or over he/she would be more likely to get Invalidity

Black Sheep said:

If your relative is aged 60 or over he/she would be more likely to get Invalidity

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He is under 60 (53) , diagnosed with a life-threatning illness , did'nt know there was a qualifying age.

Black Sheep said:

If your relative is aged 60 or over he/she would be more likely to get Invalidity

Click to expand...

Age is not the deciding factor in respect of transferring from Illness Benefit to Invalidity Pension.

Social welfare payments are broadly divided into three types:

• Contributory payments (as is the case with the OP's relative) are based on your Pay-Related Social Insurance ( PRSI) record. Whether you qualify for a payment depends on you having a certain number of PRSI contributions.
• Non-contributory payments require you to satisfy a means test and be habitually resident in the State.
• Payments and benefits, such as Child Benefit and Free Travel, do not depend on PRSI contributions or means.

For further clarification on this check out http://www.welfare.ie/EN/Publications/SW4/Pages/s1.aspx#1.1

Hope this helps.

I'm afraid age is a qualifying factor, "age over 60 and have a serious illness or incapacity". It's just one of the options when applying for Invalidity. There are other categories in which your case would be more suited ie,

permanently incapable of work
or
be incapable of work for the past 12 months and likely to be incapable for the next 12 months

However age does not apply in this case as the person is 53

It can be one of the qualifying factors as regards the medical criteria , but as I mentioned age is not the deciding factor. You indicated that if someone is aged 60 or over that they would be more likely to get Invalidity than someone under that age.

This isn’t the case. If someone satisfies the conditions for Invalidity Pension they are entitled to claim it no matter what age they are, usually aged 23 (depending on how long they have being paying PRSI) to aged 65.

In the case of a person over 60, they don’t have to have been incapable of work for at least 12 months, but still have to satisfy the other conditions.