A
female
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:My boyfriend and I have been thinking of starting a family. We currently rent a house, and live quite comfortably. We both earn £19k a year, although I understand I will be on SMP at about £450 a month, which would be enough to make ends meet, but we would obviously be stretched.I was just wondering if anyone knows, in the UK, what child benefits you are entitled to? I understand you can claim child benefit at about £20 a week, and child taxt credits (though I don't know how much that would be).Before we do start trying, I just want to know we will be able to give the child a good quality of life, and not struggle to pay the rent and bills etc!Any advice from anyone in a similar situation would be very much appreciated :) Reply to this Question
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Fancy yourself as an agony aunt? Add your answer to this question! A
female
reader, DrPsych +, writes (11 December 2010):
 It is sensible to financially plan for your children as the expense is huge. If you are on a moderate household income then there are lots of practical things to cut costs, but it does involve not being snobbish. Babies grow so quickly that you should contemplate buying good quality used clothing, and perhaps a gently used buggy. Ebay or the local paper can be a good source of bargains. You are correct that you will be entitled to child benefit. You can get maternity pay, or if something happens with the job before you enter the qualifying period then you may get maternity allowance which is calculated from your earnings in the year before you had the baby. The Government are currently changing (meddling?) with the tax credits system. As things stand at the present time you would be entitled to a small amount of money from tax credits to top up your household income. However, this may change as they are planning to change the income thresholds for entitlement. As for income support, it is unlikely that you would entitled to any help. The best thing to do would be to run your finances and circumstances through the entitled to calculator using this website link. You can enter that you have 1 child to get a ball-park figure of your entitlement as a family. Use this website to access the calculator: http://www.turn2us.org.uk/benefits_search.aspx
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