What is a Direct Payment?
Direct Payments are cash payments given to service users in place of receiving community care services they have been assessed as needing. They are intended to give users greater choice in their care. The payment must be sufficient to enable the person to purchase services to meet their assessed needs, and must be spent on services that meet the person’s needs.
The person receiving the payment needs to either

• Employ people to provide support or
• Ask a service to organise this for them.
• Councils have commissioned support organisation
• Or they can take have some combination of the two, as a result, Personal Budgets can provide a potentially good option for people.

To meet an individual's healthcare needs, the NHS may provide them with a Personal Health Budget, which is the total of their various healthcare costs. This may also be taken as a Direct Payment. A Direct Payment is not counted as income, meaning that it does not affect a person's welfare payments, and is not liable for tax.

What can the money in a Direct Payment be used for?

• The money in a Direct Payment may only be used for services outlined as necessary within the care or support plans.
• The Direct Payment of a Personal Budget may only be used to fulfil social care needs, whereas the Direct Payment of a Personal Health budget may only be used to fulfil healthcare needs.
• It may not be used for things which would be considered wrong for the government to fund. These generally include alcohol, tobacco, gambling, debt repayment, and anything which is illegal.