FOSTERING ALLOWANCE AND PAY
Our foster parents are recognised as part of our professional team and paid a generous fostering allowance that reflects their specialist skills, knowledge and experience.
HOW MUCH ARE FOSTER PARENTS PAID?
Foster parent payments vary depending on the agency or local authority you choose. Our foster parents can receive up to £36,400 fostering allowance per year, for each child – completely tax-free.
In addition, they also receive a variety of benefits, such as a holiday and summer activity allowance, school holiday and clothing payments, and access to our exclusive rewards platform.
FINANCIAL CALCULATOR
Find out how much you could receive fostering with Organic fostering...
FOSTERING ALLOWANCE BREAKDOWN
The weekly fostering payment is broken down into two key elements:
- Cost of the child – including food, clothing, utilities, transport, pocket money, outings and activities.
- Professional fee – to recognise the professionalism of a foster parent and reward them for their skills, hard work and commitment to caring for a vulnerable child.
Ongoing personal development is important to our foster parents and so we designed a payment structure that rewards continuous professional growth. Find out more about each of our payment tiers below.
PRIVATE FOSTERING AGENCY VS LOCAL AUTHORITY ALLOWANCE
Generally, independent fostering agencies offer higher fostering allowances than local authorities. This is often because the children placed with local authority foster parents are younger or have less complex needs than those placed with an independent fostering agency.
Local authorities have minimum weekly allowance guidelines for foster parents, which depend on where you live and the age of the children you care for. These minimum allowances range from £132 – £231 per week, compared to independent fostering agencies which generally pay between £350 – £450 per week. We pay between £524 – £664 per week.
As a therapeutic fostering agency, our foster parents are specially trained to care for children and young people who have faced lots of upheaval and trauma, and as such, are regarded as fellow practitioners and rewarded with a generous allowance that recognises their professionalism.
TAX AND FOSTER CARE ALLOWANCE
Foster parents receive an annual tax allowance worth £18,140 on their income from fostering, plus an additional weekly relief for each child in their care – generally making most of their fostering income tax-free.
The weekly tax relief depends on the age of the child in care:
transferring, we’ve been really impressed by the warm welcome and level of support both us and our three foster children have received.”
- £375 per week for each child under the age of 11 years old
- £450 per week for each over 11 years old
As a foster parent, you’ll be classed as self-employed and will need to submit a tax return each year to HMRC.
NATIONAL INSURANCE, BENEFITS AND PENSIONS
Most foster parents won’t need to pay National Insurance as their profit from fostering is likely under the threshold. However, some may decide to continue paying Class 2 National Insurance so they’re entitled to various state benefits in future, such as retirement pension, employment support allowance (ESA) and job seeker’s allowance.
Income from fostering shouldn’t affect means-tested benefits either as the fostering allowance isn’t counted towards income when working out the eligibility for benefits such as housing allowance, income support and more.