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  2. Benefits and money
  3. Benefits and financial support
  4. Guide to benefits
  5. After claiming benefits

Information for prisoners about benefits

Information on what happens to your benefits if you go to prison or are detained in legal custody. Find out what to do before you are released from prison in order to claim benefits and steps you can take to find work.

When you go to prison

Normally, if you are in prison or detained in legal custody, your entitlement to benefit stops and any arrears owed are automatically paid to you. 

If you think the amount of arrears paid is wrong, you can check it by contacting, or arranging with a friend or family to contact, your local Jobs and Benefits office.

Before you are released from prison

Staff in the Northern Ireland Prison Service (NIPS) as well as the Northern Ireland Association for the Care & Resettlement of Offenders (NIACRO) can complete forms and arrange advance or urgent appointments to help you claim Social Security benefits, for example, Universal Credit.

Appointments can also be made with voluntary organisations, such as advice centres.

If you are claiming benefit before you are released from prison, you can ask for appointments to coincide with home leave and the office will try to accommodate you.

What to do when you are released

You should contact your local Jobs and Benefits office or the Employment and Support Allowance Centre right away to avoid delay in dealing with your claim.

As well as benefits advice, advisers can give you information about Finance Support, including Discretionary Support. A Discretionary Support grant may help you financially when you are first released and begin to live independently in the community, provided you satisfy the eligibility conditions.

You cannot claim Discretionary Support until after you have been discharged from prison or a similar institution. 

  • Finance Support

To help find employment you should contact your local Jobs and Benefits office immediately. 

LEMIS+ Project

The LEMIS+ Project helps unemployed people overcome the issues that may be preventing them from finding and keeping a job.

The service is provided by local community employment organisations in the following areas: Lisburn and South Down, North Down and Ards, Newry and Mourne, Armagh, Banbridge, Portadown, Lurgan and Craigavon.

LEMIS+ is also available on an outreach basis throughout Northern Ireland to people with a common employability barrier such as:

  • homelessness
  • ex-offenders
  • ex-prisoners
  • individuals with a history of drug or alcohol abuse
  • leaving care

These organisations offer an impartial and confidential advice and support service to help people find a job which best suits their skills and abilities.

  • LEMIS+ Project

If your partner is in prison

If your partner is in prison you may still be entitled to benefits as long as you qualify in your own right.

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After claiming benefits

  • Appeal a benefits decision
  • Becoming an appointee for social security benefits
  • Benefit appeal hearings
  • Benefits: report a change in your circumstances
  • Going abroad
  • Information for prisoners about benefits
  • Overpayments of benefits and financial support
  • Standards Assurance Unit review to check your benefit payment

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What to do next

Comments or queries about angling can be emailed to anglingcorrespondence@daera-ni.gov.uk 

If you have a comment or query about benefits, you will need to contact the government department or agency which handles that benefit.  Contacts for common benefits are listed below.

Carer's Allowance

Call 0800 587 0912
Email 
dcs.incomingpostteamdhc2@nissa.gsi.gov.uk

Discretionary support / Short-term benefit advance

Call 0800 587 2750 
Email 
customerservice.unit@communities-ni.gov.uk

Disability Living Allowance

Call 0800 587 0912 
Email dcs.incomingpostteamdhc2@nissa.gsi.gov.uk

Employment and Support Allowance

Call 0800 587 1377

Jobseeker’s Allowance

Contact your local Jobs & Benefits office

Personal Independence Payment

Call 0800 587 0932

If your query is about another benefit, select ‘Other’ from the drop-down menu above.

Comments or queries about the Blue Badge scheme can be emailed to bluebadges@infrastructure-ni.gov.uk or you can also call 0300 200 7818.

For queries or advice about careers, contact the Careers Service.

For queries or advice about Child Maintenance, contact the Child Maintenance Service.

For queries or advice about claiming compensation due to a road problem, contact DFI Roads claim unit.

If you can’t find the information you’re looking for in the Coronavirus (COVID-19) section, then for queries about:

  • Restrictions or regulations — contact the Department of Health
  • Travel advice (including self-isolation) — contact the Department of Health
  • Coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccinations — contact the Department of Health or Public Health Agency

If your query is about another topic, select ‘Other’ from the drop-down menu above.

For queries about your identity check, email nida@nidirect.gov.uk and for queries about your certificate, email covidcertni@hscni.net.

For queries or advice about criminal record checks, email ani@accessni.gov.uk

Application and payment queries can be emailed to ema_ni@slc.co.uk

For queries or advice about employment rights, contact the Labour Relations Agency.

For queries or advice about birth, death, marriage and civil partnership certificates and research, contact the General Register Office Northern Ireland (GRONI) by email gro_nisra@finance-ni.gov.uk

For queries about the High Street Spend Local Scheme,  email HSSS.mail@economy-ni.gov.uk.

For queries about:

  • Car tax, vehicle registration and SORN
    contact the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), Swansea
     
  • Driver licensing and tests, MOT and vehicle testing
    contact the Driver & Vehicle Agency (DVA), Northern Ireland

If your query is about another topic, select ‘Other’ from the drop-down menu above.

For queries about your identity check, email nida@nidirect.gov.uk.

 

For queries or advice about passports, contact HM Passport Office.

For queries or advice about Penalty Charge Notices (PCNs), including parking tickets and bus lane PCNs, email dcu@infrastructure-ni.gov.uk

For queries or advice about pensions, contact the Northern Ireland Pension Centre.

If you wish to report a problem with a road or street you can do so online in this section.

If you wish to check on a problem or fault you have already reported, contact DfI Roads.

For queries or advice about historical, social or cultural records relating to Northern Ireland, use the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI) enquiry service.

For queries or advice about rates, email LPSCustomerTeam@lpsni.gov.uk

For queries or advice about  60+ and Senior Citizen SmartPasses (which can be used to get concessionary travel on public transport), contact Smartpass - Translink.

If you have a question about a government service or policy, you should contact the relevant government organisation directly.  We don't have access to information about you.

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