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Bereavement Support Payment

Pensions Team

Social Security Division

First Floor

Markwell House

Market Street

Douglas

IM1 2RZ

Telephone:+44 1624 685656 (option 3)

Email:Send Email

If your husband, wife, civil partner or partner you lived with as if you were married or in a civil partnership has recently died you may be able to get Bereavement Support Payment.

What is Bereavement Support Payment

Bereavement Support Payment is a benefit based on your late partner’s National Insurance (NI) contributions.

By your partner we mean either your husband, wife, civil partner or partner that you lived with as if you were married to or in a civil partnership with them at the time of their death.

Bereavement Support Payment is not means-tested. This means that any income you have or how much you have in savings will not affect what you get.

Bereavement support payment does not affect any other benefit you get.

Who can get Bereavement Support Payment

You may be able to get Bereavement Support Payment if your late partner died on or after 6 April 2017 and at the time of their death you were:

  • Under state pension age , and

  • ordinarily resident in the Isle of Man or in certain other countries

And you were:

  • Married to or in a civil partnership with the person who died, or

  • Living with the person who died as if you were married to them and you were getting Child Benefit for a child under the age of 20, or would have done so if your household income was less than £80,000 a year, or

  • Living with the person who died as if you were married to them or in a civil partnership with them and you were expecting a child

If you weren’t married to or in a civil partnership with your late partner and they were claiming Child Benefit for your child (or children) you must make a claim to transfer the Child Benefit to your name before your claim for Bereavement Support Payment can be considered.

Your late partner must have either:

  • Paid a certain amount of Class 1 or Class 2 National Insurance contributions in any tax year since 6 April 1975, or

  • Died because of an accident at work or a disease caused by work

National insurance contributions paid in the UK and in certain other countries can be counted for this purpose.

If you’re not sure whether your partner paid enough National Insurance contributions contact the Pensions Team (see contact details above).

You cannot claim Bereavement Support Payment if you’re in prison.

How and when to claim

Send your completed claim form to us as soon as you can.

You can download a claim form (BSP1) from this page or ask us to send you one.

If you don’t make your claim within 3 months of your partner’s death you may lose some benefit you might otherwise have been entitled to.

If you live in the UK you should make your claim for Bereavement Support Payment to the UK Department for Work and Pensions.

What you'll get

If you qualify for Bereavement Support Payment you will get a one-off, lump sum payment of £3,500 plus weekly payments of £139.10 (2023-2024 rate) normally for up to 78 weeks.

But if at the end of the 78 week period you are responsible for a child (or children) aged under 6 you will continue to get Bereavement Support Payment until your youngest (or only) child’s 6th birthday.

You may get Bereavement Support Payment for less than 78 weeks depending on when you reach state pension age .

Payments can be made 4-weekly directly into your bank or building society account, or you can collect them from a post office each week using a MiCard.

Payment of Bereavement Support Payment doesn’t affect entitlement to any other social security benefit you may get.

Payments of Bereavement Support Payment will not stop if you remarry, form a new civil partnership or co-habit with another person as if you’re married or civil partners.

The lump sum payment of Bereavement Support Payment is not taxable, but the weekly payments are.

More than one person may be eligible for Bereavement Support Payment in relation to the same death

It’s possible that more than one person is eligible for Bereavement Support Payment in relation to the same death.

This may be, for example, where at the time of their death the deceased person was separated (but not divorced) from their wife, husband or civil partner and was living with someone else as if they were married to them or in a civil partnership with them.

In this situation if the person who was living with the deceased person at the time of their death had a dependent child or children or was pregnant they would be entitled to Bereavement Support Payment. The deceased person’s estranged wife, husband or civil partner would not be entitled to Bereavement Support Payment.

If your partner died before 1 February 2024

You may be able to get backdated payments of Bereavement Support Payment if:

  • Your partner died on or after 6 April 2017

  • When your partner died, you were living together as if you were married, and

  • You were under state pension age on 30 August 2018

Also, you must either have been pregnant or had a child living with you when your partner died and either:

  • You’ve been getting Child Benefit for that child between when your partner died and when you make your claim for Bereavement Support Payment, or

  • You weren’t entitled to Child Benefit for that child between when your partner died and when you make your claim for Bereavement Support Payment only because of the amount of your income

You must apply for Bereavement Support Payment before 1 February 2025 to get the full amount of backdated payments. You can still apply up until 31 October 2025, but you won’t get the full amount.

You can claim even if someone else is already getting Bereavement Support Payment in relation to your partner’s death, such as an estranged wife, husband or civil partner.

If your partner died before 6 April 2017, you may be able to get Widowed Parent’s Allowance instead.

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