Conditionality

To get Universal Credit payments, you'll need to accept an agreement called a 'claimant commitment', recorded and reviewed in the claimant's online account, setting out what they agree to do to prepare for and look for work or increase their earnings. What a claimant must do depends on individual circumstances, including whether they have a health condition or are disabled, care for someone, have a child under 13, or earn above a certain amount known as the 'administrative earnings threshold'. DWP guidance describes this framework as sanction levels depending on which work-related activity, or 'conditionality', group a claimant is in, with four such sanction levels — lowest, low, medium and high — reflecting escalating categories of work-related requirement.

Conditionality is enforced through sanctions: a claimant must do everything they agree to in their commitment or their payment could be reduced or stopped, and this is called a sanction. Claimants unable to meet a requirement must contact DWP with a good reason, such as illness or a domestic emergency, before the missed activity; if no good reason is accepted, a sanction reducing the Universal Credit standard allowance can follow. Certain claimants — for example those nearing the end of life — are not subject to a claimant commitment or sanctions at all, while others are placed in less demanding conditionality groups reflecting caring responsibilities, health conditions or the age of their children.