CCM18060 - Child Benefit and Tax Credits: Child Benefit and Couples

Unlike tax credits only one person can claim Child Benefit for a qualifying child at any one time. If they have a partner they need to decide who claims Child Benefit.

If a family unit is created by two individuals who are already claiming Child Benefit they can:

• agree that one of them will claim the Child Benefit for all the qualifying children or qualifying young persons or
• choose to keep their individual claims to benefit. In this case only one of them will be entitled to the higher rate for the eldest qualifying child or qualifying young person, see CCM18050.

If you discover that someone has an undeclared partner check whether:

• they have been getting Child Benefit Lone Parent Supplement, see CCM18070.
• the partner has children and if so whether they have also been getting the higher rate of Child Benefit for the eldest child or qualifying young person, see CCM18050.

Family Unit

For Child Benefit purposes a family unit exists if a person is

• Married (and not separated by court order or separated in circumstances which mean the separation is likely to be permanent)
• Unmarried but living together as husband and wife (LTAHAW).
• Civil partners (and not separated by court order or separated in circumstances which mean the separation is likely to be permanent)
• Not civil partners but living together as civil partners (LTACP).

The higher rate of Child Benefit is only payable for the eldest child in the family unit.

Note: Before 5 December 2005 when the Civil Partnerships Act came into effect a person was treated as living with a partner or being part of a family unit only when the other person was of the opposite sex.