Hi Lucy
I work as a benefit adviser and can help you work this out.
First thing to note is if your partner isn’t working and doesn’t have either the carer element or LCWRA you won’t be able to claim childcare, as legislation means you both either need to be in work or one in work and the other receiving LCWRA or Carer element.
Calculators are as accurate as the information put in and errors are usually user-error. That being said, with Universal Credit the easiest way to work out entitlement is manually.
Each part of your household circ*mstances is awarded a standard amount and these are added together to form your base award. Then the total is deducted from based on earnings and any savings.
For your situation I’ve assumed one or both of you are over 25 and that one of your children was born before April 2017. If either of these assumptions are incorrect let me know as it changes the calculation.
Couple Standard (over 25): £509.91
2 children (one born before April 2017): £519.58
Housing: £450
Total UC before deductions: 1479.49
I haven’t included the childcare for the reasons stated above.
Wages: £2031
For your wages they use the after tax, NI and any pension contribution figure but I don’t have that figure so will use this.
They disregard the first £335 of your wages (2031-335= 1696)
And then apply the earnings taper (55p for every £ you earn) so to calculate this you’d do 1696x0.55 = £932.80
This is the amount they will deduct from your total UC award due to your wages.
So £1479.49 - 932.80 = £546.69 UC per month
As we’ve used your pre-tax and NI figure it’ll actually be slightly higher than this.
