Handling the money

What is a direct payment?

The same money, paid across. Where a council arranges support, it spends the budget on the adult's behalf. Where a direct payment is made, the money is paid to the adult, or to somebody on their behalf, so that the support the plan describes can be arranged instead. The Act carries the arrangement in three sections: section 31 for adults with capacity to request direct payments, section 32 for adults without capacity, and section 33 for further provision.

Care Act 2014, sections 31, 32 and 33. Version Latest available (Revised) as at 2 September 2026, legislation.gov.uk, read on 3 September 2026.

The figure being paid across is the one the plan carries, which is why the order of the chain matters: plan first, figure second, payment third. the personal budget explains where that figure comes from and what it is meant to buy.

What does taking the money commit you to?

Records, for a start. Money that arrives to buy support generates receipts, hours and names, and the habit that keeps all three in order is the cheapest insurance in this subject: a book of columns, a folder of receipts, and a note of what each purchase was for. The conditions attached to a payment are worth having in writing before the first one arrives, because those conditions are the terms the arrangement will be read against at the review, and a condition nobody wrote down is a condition nobody can meet.

None of this is bureaucracy for its own sake. A payment that cannot show what it bought is the easiest thing in social care to take away, and the book of columns is what stands between the two.

Where does capacity come into it?

At the door, and the Act says so in its own arrangement: one section for adults with capacity to request direct payments, another for adults without. Capacity itself is governed by a different statute, the Mental Capacity Act 2005, together with the Code of Practice that accompanies it, first published on 22 July 2013 and last updated on 14 October 2020. That update date is worth writing down, because advice given before an update may describe a version that has since changed. What capacity means and how it is assessed is the business of that Act and its Code, and this page stays inside the Care Act's own split between the two routes rather than summarising another Act it has not read section by section.

Care Act 2014, sections 31 and 32. Version Latest available (Revised) as at 2 September 2026, legislation.gov.uk, read on 3 September 2026. Mental Capacity Act 2005 Code of Practice, first published 22 July 2013, last updated 14 October 2020, GOV.UK, read on 3 September 2026.

What if you cannot hold the money yourself?

Section 32 is titled Adults without capacity, and it is the route by which a payment can still happen where an adult cannot request one. Who receives the money and manages it, and on what conditions, is the part of the arrangement to have in writing before the first payment, because those conditions are what the arrangement rests on and the place a disagreement will land. your rights under the law sets out the right to be helped to take part in the decisions along the way, and independent advice and advocacy explains where an advocate fits when capacity is the question.

Does the money ever pay somebody you employ?

The plan decides what the money buys, and where it buys hours of support arranged by you, the arrangement can come to look like employment, with everything that follows from that: hours agreed in advance, records kept, and the obligations an employer carries. Those obligations are read from the same texts in what a provider must do, and the position of somebody employed to support another adult, rather than employing them, is described in supported employment. The two directions of the same relationship raise the same questions about pay and records, which is why they are written up side by side across this handbook.

How is this money different from a benefit?

By payer and by purpose. A direct payment comes from the council and is tied to the plan. A benefit comes from the Department for Work and Pensions and is decided on its own rules, on its own forms, by a different organisation. The two can exist side by side and they are assessed separately, and where a question is about a benefit rather than about care and support, the answer lives on the GOV.UK page for that benefit, each of which carries its own update date. The distinction is the one drawn on the page about the budget: a personal budget is the cost of meeting needs under the Care Act, worked out under the Care Act.

Care Act 2014, section 26, Personal budget. Version Latest available (Revised) as at 2 September 2026, legislation.gov.uk, read on 3 September 2026.

Where does this step sit in the journey?

At step 12 of fourteen, after the plan and the budget, and it is the last step at which the arrangement is still being built rather than argued over. the route map puts the three sections that carry direct payments next to the step, and the rows before it show what has to exist before a payment can start.

Sources read for this page

• Care Act 2014, revised text on legislation.gov.uk, version Latest available (Revised) as at 2 September 2026
• Mental Capacity Act 2005, revised text on legislation.gov.uk
• Mental Capacity Act 2005 Code of Practice, updated 14 October 2020
• GOV.UK pages on benefits and entitlements, each with its own update date

Each source above was opened on 3 September 2026. Where a page here prints a section number or a figure, the source line beside it names the version that number was read from.