Brendan Griffin (Kerry, Fine Gael)
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1096. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if a period when a person (details supplied) in County Kerry was in receipt of illness benefit will be taken into account when assessing the qualifying period in a back-to-education allowance application; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [45289/18]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The customer named applied for Back to Education (BTEA) – Third Level Allowance on 15 August 2018. He wished to undertake a level 7 degree commencing on 17 September 2018 - accordingly, he was required to have 234days paidimmediately prior to this date.

On 3 September his application was refused due to ‘insufficient paid days’. He had 148 paid daysup to and including 29 September 2018.

On 10 September 2018, his Jobseekers Benefit exhausted (having reached 156 paid days).

On 23 September 2018 he submitted a request to review of his BTEA decision.

On 24 September 2018, he requested that his claim be closed and to date he has not made a repeat application.

When reviewing his BTEA application, the following were considered:

- Client was on Jobseekers Allowance from 20 October 2014 to 24 February 2015 (65 paid days)

- Client was on Illness Benefit from 02 May 2016 to 9 August 2016 (No paid daysas he did not qualify)

- Client was on Jobseekers Benefit from 15 January 2018 to 10 September 2018 (156 paid days)

In relation to Illness Benefit the BTEA Guidelines state that to qualify a person must be on that payment for 2 years or more. However, periods spent on Illness Benefit can count towards the qualifying period if the customer qualifies from another payment. Half of the qualifying period must relate to the qualifying payment.

The decision reached was that the period spent on Illness Benefit could not be counted under his BTEA application as:

- The customer did not qualify for the payment

- There is no paid days from this payment

In addition he did not qualify from the Jobseekers Allowance claim (20 October 2014 to 24 February 2015) as those schemes do not link.

The Deciding Officer also took into account the guidelines in relation the periods of time spent on qualifying payments including:

- Periods spent on any qualifying payment which are not broken by more than 12 months can be used in determining if an applicant satisfies the qualifying period.

It was concluded that there cannot be a break of more than 12 months, and in this case there was a break of 17 months between his Illness Benefit claim and his Jobseekers Benefit claim; therefore, his 65 paid days while on Jobseekers Allowance claim cannot be considered.

In the decision notification, the customer was advised that there is strict adherence to the condition of being in receipt of qualifying Social Welfare payment for a specified period of time (234 days) as per guidelines.

I trust this clarifies the matter.