The Family Credit (General) Amendment Regulations 1990
These Regulations further amend the Family Credit (General) Regulations 1987 in the following respects–they provide that a person is to be treated as engaged in work or carrying out activities during meal or refreshment breaks for which he is, or expects to be, paid (regulations 2 and 3(c)); and for a person to be treated as normally engaged in remunerative work if that work will last 5 weeks or more from the date of claim (regulation 3(b));they exclude from the category of persons of a prescribed description persons receiving advanced education and any person who has ceased full-time education but is still treated as a child for the purposes of child benefit (regulation 4) and amend the definition of a course of advanced education (regulation 12);they provide for normal weekly earnings of an employed earner to be assessed over 5 consecutive weeks in the 6 weeks immediately preceding the week of claim and for bonus and commission payments to be calculated separately before inclusion as part of normal weekly earnings; make provision for determining a person’s normal weekly earnings where he has recently changed the number of hours worked and make certain other minor amendments (regulations 5 and 7);they provide for certain periods in which a bonus or commission is paid to be disregarded in determining the assessment period (regulation 6) and for calculating the amount of any bonus or commission where separate calculation is appropriate (regulation 8);they amend the provision for determining whether income derived from the provision of board and lodging accommodation is to be calculated as earnings and, where it is not earnings, provide for a disregard of £20.00 and 50 per cent of any excess (regulations 9, 10 and 14(e)); and treat third party payments in respect of the community charge as notional income and capital (regulation 11);they increase from £5 to £10 the disregard in respect of charitable or voluntary payments, a student’s income and war pensions; and provide for certain payments made to war widows, community charge benefit, payments conse quent on a reduction in the personal community charge, and grants made to assist local authority tenants to purchase or repair their home to be disregarded (regulations 13, 14(a) to (d) and (f) and 15).