Infected Blood Payment Scheme
The Infected Blood Payment Scheme for Northern Ireland provides support to you and your family if you have been infected by HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) and/ or hepatitis C after treatment with blood, or blood products from the NHS.
Eligibility
To be eligible, you must be infected with HIV and/ or hepatitis C as a result of contaminated blood, or blood products during NHS treatment in Northern Ireland.
You are also eligible if you became infected by someone (for example, your spouse, civil partner, partner or parent) whose HIV and/ or hepatitis C is from receiving contaminated blood, or blood products during NHS treatment in Northern Ireland.
Bereaved spouses, civil partners and long-term partners of those infected with HIV or hepatitis C as a result of treatment with NHS blood or blood products, who themselves were not infected, may also be eligible for support if they were co-habiting at the time of death.
If you now live in another country, you are still eligible if the treatment took place in Northern Ireland.
Support available
The scheme offers various types of financial support, including:
- lump sum payments
- regular monthly or quarterly payments
- discretionary one-off grant payments
- annual winter fuel payments
Tax and benefits
Since 1988, successive governments have set up various schemes to provide financial support to individuals infected with hepatitis C, HIV or both through NHS treatment with contaminated blood products. The longstanding position has been that such ex gratia payments should be free from tax.
Following the introduction of new schemes, legislation was introduced in 2017 to make sure that periodical payments to beneficiaries from those schemes were free from income tax, in the same way as periodical payments from existing schemes.
The exemption only extends to the periodical payments or annuities for the damages. Any return from investing those sums is not exempted. Once any money received from compensation is invested any interest received on that investment will be taxable in the normal way and should be declared in tax returns and self assessments.
Independent financial advice should be sought as previously advertised.
Payments from the NI Scheme are not taken into account when applying for any of the following means-tested benefits from the Department for Communities (DfC):
- Income Support
- Housing Benefit
- Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)
- Employment & Support Allowance (ESA)
- State Pension Credit
- Universal Credit
However, you must still declare to DfC any payments you receive from the NI Scheme or interim compensation from the UKG.
How to apply
To apply, contact the Infected Blood Payment Scheme for Northern Ireland.