People living as husband and wife or as civil partners

• What we mean by ‘living together as husband and wife or as civil partners’
• How we decide whether people are living as husband and wife or as civil partners
• What happens after the interview

We treat couples who are married or civil partners and couples who live together as husband and wife or as civil partners in the same way for Pension Credit.

What we mean by ‘living together as husband and wife or as civil partners’

‘Living together as husband and wife or as civil partners’, means that two people live together and share their lives in the same way as if they were married or as if they were civil partners.

How we decide whether people are living as husband and wife or as civil partners

When your customer applies for Pension Credit we will ask them some questions about their living arrangements. If their situation is still not clear we will visit them at home to interview them about their circumstances to see if they share their life together in the same way as a married couple or civil partners.

It would be helpful if the other person your customer shares their accommodation with is also there when we visit, but this is not essential.

There is no single factor that, on its own, shows that people are living together as husband and wife or as civil partners.

We will ask your customer:

• how they came to share accommodation
• how they share their home and lives,
• what plans, if any, they have for the future.

We will not ask intimate questions.

We will note down what your customer says, using their own words.

What happens after the interview

A decision maker will look at your customer’s and their partner’s answers and decide if their life is like a marriage or civil partnership or not. We will write and tell your customer the decision.

If your customer and their partner have only recently started to live in the same accommodation, the decision maker may decide that their life together is not at present, like a marriage or civil partnership. If so, we will look at their situation again at a later date. We will write to your customer again about this.