Does PIP remove the £29,000 spouse visa income requirement?

01 / The legal gateway

The specified benefit changes the test; it does not abolish it.

Appendix FM ordinarily requires a partner on the 5-year route to satisfy the applicable minimum income requirement. Where the sponsor receives a listed disability, carer, armed forces or police benefit, paragraphs E-ECP.3.3 and E-LTRP.3.3 instead require adequate maintenance and accommodation without recourse to additional public funds.

The Home Office public guide states the practical consequence directly: the couple does not need to meet the ordinary minimum income requirement where the sponsoring partner receives a listed benefit. The legal conclusion is not that finance has become irrelevant. It is that the application has moved from a gross annual threshold to a net weekly household assessment.

The benefit award should therefore be treated as gateway evidence. The decision notice, current entitlement and payment evidence must identify the award and recipient. The maintenance schedule then performs a separate task: it proves that the family will have the required weekly resources after housing costs.

02 / Which benefits qualify

PIP is one qualifying benefit, but Universal Credit by itself is not the gateway.

The current list includes Disability Living Allowance, Personal Independence Payment, Attendance Allowance, Carer’s Allowance, Severe Disablement Allowance, Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit and specified armed forces and police payments. It also includes the listed Scottish disability and carer payments, including Adult Disability Payment, Child Disability Payment, Carer Support Payment and Pension Age Disability Payment.

The sponsor must be receiving one of the benefits named by the Rules. Universal Credit, Child Benefit, Housing Benefit or another payment may be relevant income within the calculation where the guidance permits it, but receipt of that payment alone does not place a partner application within the specified-benefit exception.

The identity of the recipient matters. A prospective entitlement which the overseas applicant expects to acquire after arrival is not current income for this assessment. An award to another member of the household should not be assumed to satisfy the sponsor gateway without matching the award to the precise Appendix FM provision.

03 / The calculation

Use A minus B is greater than or equal to C, with current figures.

The Home Office formula is A – B ≥ C. A is current weekly net income after income tax and National Insurance, together with any permitted weekly equivalent of cash savings. B is weekly housing costs. C is the Income Support amount for a British family of equivalent size.

Income paid monthly, every 4 weeks or at another interval must be converted consistently to a weekly figure. Variable net income is averaged in accordance with the guidance. The same discipline applies to rent, mortgage and Council Tax. The decision maker must use the comparator rates in force at the date of decision, so an old online example is not a safe final calculation.

The margin should be visible. A schedule which merely states that adequate maintenance is met invites the decision maker to reconstruct the case. A controlled schedule identifies each source, payment interval, weekly conversion, housing deduction, household component and the resulting surplus or shortfall.

04 / What can count

Current lawful income is different from hoped-for work after arrival.

The sponsor’s current net employment or self-employment income, relevant non-employment income, pension and benefits may be counted where the Rules and guidance permit and the required evidence is supplied. Benefits which are counted as income should be shown by current official entitlement and payment records rather than a historic award letter alone.

An applicant already in the UK may rely on employment income where they are lawfully working. An entry clearance applicant cannot ordinarily turn a prospective UK job into current weekly income. Nor can an expected future benefit entitlement after arrival be added to the calculation.

Promises of support from relatives should not be imported from routes which expressly permit credible third-party support. The family route calculation is built from the sources permitted for the relevant applicant and evidenced under Appendix FM-SE. A gift may become qualifying cash savings if the ownership, control, source and holding-period requirements are met; a promise to pay living costs is a different proposition.

05 / Cash savings

Adequate maintenance uses savings differently from the £29,000 test.

Qualifying cash savings can be used in full for adequate maintenance. The £16,000 disregard associated with the ordinary minimum income calculation does not apply. The funds must still satisfy Appendix FM-SE, including ownership, control, immediate accessibility and the usual 6-month holding period unless a specific exception applies.

For entry clearance or limited permission, the eligible savings are divided by the number of weeks in the proposed grant and the resulting weekly amount is added to A. For indefinite leave, Appendix FM-SE directs the decision maker to divide the eligible savings by 52.

This distinction is commercially important. A family may fail if it applies the ordinary cash-savings formula, but it can also overstate its position if it simply adds the full bank balance to weekly income. The savings must be converted using the rule for the application actually being made.

06 / Housing and family size

Low rent can improve the calculation, but accommodation remains a separate legal requirement.

B includes the evidenced rent or mortgage and Council Tax costs. Personal loans, credit cards and ordinary household expenditure are not deducted in the Home Office formula. A careful schedule therefore follows the published method rather than substituting a private affordability budget.

Housing also has to be adequate in the legal sense: lawfully occupied, available to the family, not overcrowded and not contrary to public health rules. Passing the financial formula does not prove adequate accommodation, and an inspection report is not automatically required to prove the housing case.

The household must be complete. Children and other family members who form part of the relevant family unit can change C even if they are British or hold a different immigration status. The guidance requires resources for the family unit as a whole, not only for the person applying for permission.

07 / Specified evidence

The calculation is only as strong as the records beneath it.

Appendix FM-SE paragraph 12A sets out the evidence framework. Current salaried employment normally requires an employer letter confirming gross and net salary, duration and employment type, together with payslips and matching bank statements. Self-employment, company income, non-employment income and cash savings each engage their own evidence provisions.

The benefit gateway should be established by official evidence of current entitlement and the bank record of payment. Housing evidence should show the legal basis of occupation, the actual rent or mortgage, Council Tax and who will live at the address. Every figure in the schedule should be traceable to a dated document.

Where income varies or a benefit has changed, explain the period selected and the weekly conversion. Silence is risky where a bank statement shows payments which no longer match the award letter. The objective is not a large bundle, but a calculation which the caseworker can reproduce without inventing facts.

08 / Extension and settlement

The applicable test can change before the next application.

A partner who receives entry clearance or further permission on the 5-year route must meet the financial requirement again at the next stage. If the sponsoring partner still receives a specified benefit, adequate maintenance remains the relevant framework. If that benefit has ceased, the ordinary minimum income requirement can apply instead.

For settlement on the 5-year partner route, GOV.UK confirms that specified-benefit cases continue to use adequate maintenance. Cash savings are then divided by 52 rather than by the weeks in a limited grant. The household, current income, housing costs and evidence must be rebuilt for the settlement application rather than copied from an earlier decision.

The practical strategy is to monitor the benefit award and the household evidence throughout the route. A successful first application is not an assurance that the same test, income sources or figures will govern an extension or indefinite leave application made years later.

Practical questions.