‒ For working people with low earnings and low hourly rates of pay struggling to afford the rising costs of housing, utility bills and food, any extra help they can get to top up their income from earnings and UC payments could often be a lifeline, acting as a vital safety net.

‒ In the absence of a substantial rise in benefit levels and/or wage rates, sources of means-tested help that sit outside Universal Credit are likely to continue playing a crucial role in supporting the living standards of working individuals and families for the foreseeable future.

‒ While all participants had levels of earnings low enough to entitle them to Universal Credit, only in rare instances (such as the Government’s Cost of Living payments) did UC receipt, of itself, automatically qualify them for help.

‒ Many working claimants were ineligible for support due to the very low earnings thresholds which applied to most of the schemes. Others had variable earnings which meant they dipped in and out of eligibility from one month to the next. Some were unaware that additional help was available. Others were put off from applying because they had insufficient time; application processes could be onerous and time-consuming.

‒ The patchwork of independently administered, often discretionary, schemes has grown with little coherence or strategic overview. It is generally left to the designated government department, devolved administration, local council or utility provider to raise awareness of their schemes and to determine how much help any particular applicant, in any particular year, may get.

‒ Whether people knew about, were entitled to, able to apply for and successfully awarded any help was a hit-and-miss lottery of postcodes, personal circumstances and happenchance.

‒ Separate entitlement rules, earnings thresholds and application procedures add complexity to the social security landscape, creating barriers to access and administrative burdens for claimants, and countering UC’s goal of simplification. The schemes can also be complex and costly for administering authorities to deliver, particularly when people’s earnings are subject to frequent change.

‒ Different income thresholds attaching to the different schemes undermine the policy rationale of having a single taper rate in UC as earnings rise, making it hard for claimants to calculate or reliably estimate the financial impact that working longer and earning more will have. Fluctuating earnings and monthly assessment in UC, in which entitlement can vary from month to month, compounds this difficulty.

‒ Much-needed sources of cash and in-kind help that reduced or were withdrawn, sometimes simultaneously, when earnings increased or rose above a certain level, left some people worse off, countering UC’s goal of ‘making work pay.’

‒ Loss of entitlement to council tax support when monthly earnings increased, even by just a few pounds, meant some participants were financially worse off by working more, contributing to arrears and debts, both of council tax and more widely.

‒ The uncertainty and potential reduction in household income that loss of entitlement to means-tested help outside of UC can cause influenced the decisions some claimants made about whether, when, and how much, to work and earn.

‒ To avoid the loss of income, some of those whose UC conditionality requirements did not oblige them to work, meet the AET or earn more, reduced their hours of work or withdrew from the labour market altogether.

‒ A review of passported benefits and means-tested help that sit outside the main working-age benefits is needed, exploring, in particular, their interaction with UC and the effects on work incentives.

‒ Entitlement rules and earnings thresholds of the different means-tested schemes need to be simplified and standardised. Fairer and more consistent methods are also needed for withdrawing support as earnings rise.

‒ Entitlements should be regularly uprated to keep pace with inflation and to better support work incentives.

‒ The income volatility and work disincentives caused by the interaction between UC and council tax reduction schemes need to be reduced.

‒ Entitlement to free school meals should be extended beyond households with earnings below the current £7,400 threshold, to a much wider group of UC claimants.

‒ The social tariffs offered by some telecoms and broadband companies should be offered by other utility providers, with eligibility extended to all UC claimants.

‒ Communication about and signposting to the different means-tested schemes needs to be increased and enhanced, making better use of the UC journal and technology more generally.

‒ Auto-enrolment and the automatic passporting of entitlement should be increased.

‒ The interaction between earnings, passported benefits and other means-tested support should be included as part of the Government’s formal review into UC and commitment to ‘make work pay’.

‒ Additional means-tested help, and the link with employment and work incentives, should also be included in the remits of the Government’s new Child Poverty Taskforce and Child Poverty Unit, as part of their work to develop a new child poverty strategy.