Carer's assessment
Getting a carer's assessment
If you are looking after your mum or dad, you are entitled to your own assessment, separate from any assessment of what care they need. This is called a carer's assessment, and it looks at what you need, not what they need.
What it covers
Under the Care Act 2014, a council must assess a carer's needs whenever it appears the carer may need support, regardless of your finances, and regardless of how much care you are already giving. The assessment has to look at two separate questions:
- Whether you are able, and likely to continue to be able, to provide care
- Whether you are willing, and likely to continue to be willing, to do so
Both are asked twice over. Now, and whether that's likely to still be true later. A temporary yes is not the same as a permanent one, and the law has a place to record that.
The assessment also has to consider what you want out of your own life. Your work, your education, the things you'd do if you had more time. It also has to consider whether support could help you do those things alongside caring.
How to ask for one
Contact adult social services at the council where your parent lives (not necessarily where you live). Ask specifically for "a carer's assessment under the Care Act 2014." You can ask for this alongside your parent's own needs assessment, or separately, at any time. You do not need to wait for a crisis.
Being told you're not entitled to one
The duty to assess applies regardless of the council's own view of how severe your situation is, or what your finances look like. If you're told you don't qualify for the assessment itself, rather than for the support that might follow it, that's worth checking against the law directly, using the source below.
Sources
- Care Act 2014, Section 10 The statutory duty to carry out a carer's assessment, and what it must consider.
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