Child Benefit and Home Education

Many home educators ask about Child Benefit when they are contemplating home education. Child Benefit is payable to ALL children, whether they attend school or are educated otherwise.

Prior to children reaching the age of 16, parents will receive a letter from the Child Benefit Office asking whether the child will be continuing their full time education post 16. It is at this point you should confirm that your child will be continuing home education.

Provided the child has been home educated BEFORE the age of 16, and this initial contact will establish this, then Child Benefit will continue post 16. The Education Section at the Child Benefit Offices (Northern Ireland as well as the rest of the UK), use section DMG11094 (Decision Makers Guide) to decide whether or not full time education is taking place. DMG11094 states:

Full-time education
To decide whether education undertaken elsewhere is full-time, the decision maker should consider the guidance in DMG11093. This might include unsupervised study since the circumstances of home education could be quite different from those at a recognised educational establishment. If the decision maker is satisfied that the number of hours studied each week exceeds 12 they should accept the education as full-time.

If the child BEGINS home education after the age of 16, then DMG11093 applies:

Full-time Education
A full-time education course is one where a person attends a recognised educational establishment to study for more than twelve hours per week . To calculate the number of hours spent on a course

1. take into account any time
   1.1) receiving instruction or tuition
   1.2) undertaking supervised study
   1.3) undertaking examination or practical work
   1.4) taking part in any exercise, experiment or project that forms part of the course.
2. do not take into account time spent on
   2.1) meal breaks
   2.2) unsupervised study or homework which is undertaken outside normal hours whether on or off the premises of the educational establishment.

Many of the Child Benefit Enquiry Line operators are not aware of the rules applicable to home educators and can give out wrong information. If you contact them and are told that your Child Benefit will be stopped, ask to be put on to the Full Time Education Section so that you can get the correct information.

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