Pensioner council tax reduction: applicable amount (post-April-2021 allowance, children, severe disability premium) and income (Child Benefit, tariff income) #1933

Found while building #1909 (Pension Credit disregard in pensioner CTR). The law cites below were read on legislation.gov.uk on 2026-09-30; re-verify them before encoding.

Pensioner applicable amount

council_tax_reduction_applicable_amount builds the amount from the Housing Benefit personal allowances plus benefits_premiums. Three gaps:

• Personal allowance. It uses the pre-April-2021 pensioner allowance for everyone: £256.00 single and £383.35 couple in 2026-27. SI 2012/2885 Sch 2 para 1, WSI 2013/3029 Sch 2 para 1 and SSI 2012/319 Sch 1 para 2 give £238.00 single and £363.25 couple where the applicant or partner reached pensionable age on or after 1 April 2021.
• Children. There is no child or young person allowance and no family premium (Sch 2 paras 2-3).
• Severe disability premium. It computes 0 for a single attendance allowance recipient who lives alone. The premium is £86.05 a week in 2026-27 (Sch 2 Part 3 para 6(2)(a)).

A Housing Benefit session is adding pension-age allowance cohort parameters for HB (branch hb-pension-age-allowance-cohorts). CTR should reuse them.

Pensioner income

council_tax_reduction_applicable_income has two gaps:

• Child Benefit. It counts Child Benefit, which SI 2012/2885 Sch 1 para 16(1)(j)(vi) excludes for pensioners.
• Tariff income. It has no tariff income from capital for pensioners who do not receive Pension Credit: £1 a week per £500 over £10,000 (Sch 1 para 37; WSI 2013/3029 Sch 1 para 31).

The same variable also feeds the working-age schemes in Scotland and Wales, so check their rules separately.

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