Foster Care Allowance

How much do foster carers get paid?

Once we’ve approved you to provide paid foster care, you will receive foster care pay (known as a fostering allowance) that are generous and extremely competitive with other independent agencies and local authorities. At Tutis we also pay an additional allowance for a child's birthday and festive holidays.  For most foster carers, this will be tax free and will not affect benefits you’re currently receiving.  This is also dependent on the placements you have and your own availability to take placements that are matched to you.

The HMRC has a special scheme for foster parents which offers significant tax relief for looking after children. This scheme is called "Qualifying Care Relief" and means that in most cases, foster parents earn below the minimum earning threshold, and won't have to pay any tax at all.

Qualifying Care Relief allows foster parents to receive payments to care for looked after children and young people up to their tax threshold without having to pay any tax. It is deducted from your overall income, including your fostering allowance.

Qualifying care relief compromises of two parts:

1. Annual tax allowance - you can receive £18,140 in fostering income, per year, before you have to pay any tax.
2. Weekly relief - a weekly tax relief amount for each child in your care:

• £375 per week for children under 11

Some of our foster carers give up their jobs to care for children, so the foster care pay they receive is vital to support them and their household. And, while money is not the main motivation for people to become foster carers, nevertheless our foster carers perform a really important role, so it’s right that they are properly remunerated.

If you’re considering going into paid foster care, this section will explain about pay, allowances, tax, National Insurance, state benefits and pensions.

How fostering pay works

We want you to feel financially secure when you’re a foster carer with us, so you can focus your attention on providing great care and enjoying a good quality of life. That’s why foster care pay from Tutis Foster Care fostering allowances are higher than the recommended allowances.

We want you to have peace of mind. We recognise that foster caring can sometimes be stressful. It’s important not to have money worries so you can care for the children in the way you’d like to and also look after your own wellbeing.

Here are some important things to remember about foster carer payments:

• You will be paid a generous fostering allowance for each foster child.
• You probably won’t pay any tax on your fostering allowance – see our Tax and Foster Care
• Most state benefits are not affected by your fostering allowance – see our Foster Carers, State Benefits and Pensions
• You’ll need to register as self-employed and pay National Insurance Contributions – learn how to do this on our Tax and Foster Care
• You might also be entitled to Working Tax Credit and other state benefits – see our Foster Carers, State Benefits and Pensions

Examples of foster care payments**