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FREE CHECKER · UNIVERSAL CREDIT 2026

Severe Conditions Criteria checker: do you meet the four tests?

If you first told Universal Credit about your condition on or after 6 April 2026, the LCWRA element is £217.26 a month, or £429.80 if a Schedule 7 descriptor applies to you constantly and for life, because of a lifelong condition diagnosed in NHS care (regulation 40A). Check the four tests free, in the words of the law.

The Severe Conditions Criteria (SCC) are a Universal Credit test. On a claim where you first told Universal Credit about your condition on or after 6 April 2026, they decide whether the LCWRA element is the higher £429.80 a month or the lower £217.26: a difference of £212.54 a month, about £2,550 a year. GOV.UK also says people assessed as having a severe, lifelong condition will not usually need another assessment. Four questions and about two minutes, with an honest answer, including when it is probably not.

StartAbout your claim

Which of these fits your Universal Credit claim?
Where do you live?

Test 1LCWRA from the activities

The criteria build on LCWRA (limited capability for work and work-related activity). It has to come from at least one of the 22 descriptors in Schedule 7, not from another route.

Do you have LCWRA, or does an LCWRA descriptor fit you?

Test 2Constantly and for life

Think about the descriptor that applies most often. In the law, "constantly" means at all times, or on every occasion you do or try the activity. LCWRA itself only needs the majority of the time.

Answer as things really are. The DWP checks your form against your medical evidence and the assessment, and these criteria are stricter than LCWRA. An honest "most of the time" still counts for LCWRA.

How often does it apply?
Will it stay that way?

Test 3A lifelong condition

Is the condition that causes it one you will have for the rest of your life?

Test 4The diagnosis

Who diagnosed the condition?
Works in your browser. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere unless you ask us to email the result.

The Severe Conditions Criteria Pack

For a Universal Credit claim where the criteria may apply to you. You tell us about your conditions and the descriptors, and in about two minutes your pack is on screen, ready to print as a PDF and in your inbox.

Your position, test by testThe five tests in regulation 40A applied to your answers, descriptor by descriptor, with one thing to do about each.
WCA50 answers that tell the truthFor each descriptor, the answer for the right WCA50 questions and which box is the accurate one. If it applies most of the time but not every time, the answer says so and still supports LCWRA.
Question 30 and Other informationYour conditions written for question 30, and a paragraph for question 101 that sets out the four criteria in your facts when they may apply.
A letter to your GP or consultantAsking, in their own words, for the diagnosis, whether it is lifelong, the prognosis and whether the limitation applies all the time. Plus a request for copies of the records you already have, which are normally free.
Your evidence checklistWhat shows each test, what you already have and where to get the rest.
If the criteria are refusedA mandatory reconsideration letter on the regulation 40A grounds, the deadline worked out from your decision date and what happens next.
Severe Conditions Criteria Pack
£39.99

One-off payment · ready in about two minutes · Universal Credit in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland

Bought a Full Report, Done For You or MR Pack from us in the last 36 hours? Open this page from the link in your report to add the pack for £29.99.

Run the free checker first: the pack is built for claims where the criteria may apply.

The Severe Conditions Criteria in law: regulation 40A

Regulation 40A of the Universal Credit Regulations 2013 was inserted by the Universal Credit Act 2025 and has applied since 6 April 2026. Paragraphs (2) to (5), word for word:

(2) A claimant is a severe conditions criteria claimant on the basis of an assessment under this Part if:

(a) the claimant has limited capability for work and work-related activity on the basis of an assessment under this Part (see regulation 40(2)), and

(b) at least one of the descriptors set out in Schedule 7 constantly applies to the claimant and will do so for the rest of the claimant’s life.

(3) In assessing the extent of a claimant’s capability to perform any activity listed in Schedule 7, it is a condition that the claimant’s incapability to perform the activity arises:

(a) in respect of descriptors 1 to 8, 15(a), 15(b), 16(a) and 16(b), from a specific bodily disease or disablement: (i) that the claimant will have for the rest of their life, and (ii) that has been diagnosed by an appropriately qualified health care professional in the course of the provision of NHS services, or

(b) in respect of descriptors 9 to 14, 15(c), 15(d), 16(c) and 16(d), from a specific mental illness or disablement: (i) that the claimant will have for the rest of their life, and (ii) that has been diagnosed by an appropriately qualified health care professional in the course of the provision of NHS services.

(4) A descriptor constantly applies to a claimant if that descriptor applies to the claimant at all times or, as the case may be, on all occasions on which the claimant undertakes or attempts to undertake the activity described by that descriptor.

(5) In this regulation “NHS services” means:

(a) health care services provided for the purposes of the health service continued under: (i) section 1(1) of the National Health Service Act 2006; (ii) section 1(1) of the National Health Service (Wales) Act 2006; (iii) section 1(1) of the National Health Service (Scotland) Act 1978;

(b) health and social care within the meaning of the Health and Social Care (Reform) Act (Northern Ireland) 2009 provided for the purposes of the system promoted under section 2(1) of that Act.

Source: legislation.gov.uk, Universal Credit Regulations 2013, regulation 40A. The dashes that introduce the lists in the original are shown here as colons.

In Northern Ireland the same test is regulation 41A of the Universal Credit Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2016, with "health and social care services" in place of NHS services. Compare regulation 40(4), the test for LCWRA itself: a descriptor applies if it applies "for the majority of the time or, as the case may be, on the majority of the occasions".

Who already keeps the higher £429.80

You are a pre-2026 claimant, and keep £429.80 a month, if your Universal Credit included the LCWRA element at any time before 6 April 2026 and has included it without a break since. A gap that began because your income was too high does not count if the award started again within 6 months (regulation 27A). Schedule 5A adds four more groups, each keeping the higher amount once the element is in the award and for as long as it stays there without a break:

  • you were waiting for your first Work Capability Assessment before 6 April 2026 and were then found to have LCWRA (paragraph 2);
  • you had limited capability for work and were waiting to be assessed again before 6 April 2026, then were found to have LCWRA (paragraph 3);
  • you had been found to have LCWRA before 6 April 2026 but were still in the 3-month waiting period (paragraph 4);
  • you were getting ESA with the support component before 6 April 2026 and still were when your Universal Credit with the LCWRA element started (paragraph 5).

People who are terminally ill get the higher amount whenever they claim. In a joint claim where you both have LCWRA, you get one element, at the higher amount if either of you qualifies for it (regulation 27(4)). For all of these people, meeting the Severe Conditions Criteria adds no money, although it can still mean no routine reassessment.

How the DWP decides the Severe Conditions Criteria

  • Your WCA50. The WCA50 (03/26) says on page 22: "If you think you meet the Severe Conditions Criteria, please send any supporting medical evidence you already have with this questionnaire." It also says "only send us copies of medical or other information if you already have them. Do not ask or pay for new information or send us original documents."
  • The health professional. DWP guidance tells its health professionals to consider all four criteria where they find LCWRA from the activities, and to justify each one. They must not advise the criteria where LCWRA rests only on a "treat as" rule such as substantial risk, cancer treatment, pregnancy risk or end of life.
  • The four criteria in DWP guidance. LCWRA from a functional impairment that "always would meet this at repeated / future assessments"; a condition that will last for the rest of your life; no realistic prospect of recovery of function; and a condition that is "unambiguous", diagnosed by a qualified and regulated NHS professional, or one outside the NHS "as long as there is documented evidence within the NHS record and it aligns with NHS best practice" (WCA handbook, Appendix 4).
  • The letter. GOV.UK says you get a letter after the assessment if the DWP finds you have a severe, lifelong condition, and you will not usually need another assessment. In law, once the DWP has decided you meet the criteria, it does not assess you again unless there is evidence of a mistake or a change in your condition (regulation 41(4) to (6)).
  • Returning the form and going to the assessment. Without a good reason, not returning the questionnaire or not attending the assessment means you are treated as not meeting the criteria (regulations 43 and 44).
  • The waiting period. The criteria do not shorten the 3-month waiting period before the LCWRA element is added (regulation 28).
Not sure you have LCWRA yet?

The criteria build on LCWRA. The free LCWRA checker goes through all 22 descriptors in the words of the law, the substantial risk rule and which 2026 amount applies to you.

Open the LCWRA checker →

If the DWP says no

A decision letter may not use the words "Severe Conditions Criteria": it may simply give you LCWRA at £217.26 a month. If you think you meet the criteria, ask for a mandatory reconsideration within one month of the date of the decision. If you ask for written reasons within that month, you get 14 more days. A late request can still be accepted within a further 12 months if there were special circumstances (regulations 5 and 6 of SI 2013/381). If the mandatory reconsideration notice still says no, you can appeal to the First-tier Tribunal within one month of the date it was sent (rule 22 of the Social Entitlement Chamber Rules).

Once the DWP has decided you do not meet the criteria, it does not assess that again unless there is new evidence of a mistake or a change in your condition (regulation 41(5)), so the mandatory reconsideration is the time to send your evidence.

In Northern Ireland the Department for Communities makes the decision, under its own regulations: you also have one month to ask for a mandatory reconsideration (regulation 5 of the Northern Ireland Decisions and Appeals Regulations 2016), the mandatory reconsideration notice tells you how to appeal and a refusal of the criteria is not assessed again without new evidence (regulation 42(5) of the Universal Credit Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2016).

Frequently asked questions

A Universal Credit test in regulation 40A of the Universal Credit Regulations 2013, in force since 6 April 2026. You meet it if you have LCWRA on an assessment and at least one Schedule 7 descriptor applies to you constantly, meaning at all times or every time you try, and will do for the rest of your life, because of a lifelong condition diagnosed by a qualified health professional in NHS care.
On a claim where you first told Universal Credit about your condition on or after 6 April 2026, the LCWRA element is £217.26 a month, or £429.80 if the DWP decides you meet the criteria (2026/27). That is £212.54 a month more, about £2,550 a year, on top of the standard allowance. Pre-2026 claimants and people who are terminally ill already get £429.80, so for them the criteria add no money.
No. The test is about a descriptor and how constantly it applies, not the name of a condition. DWP guidance gives its health professionals four criteria to check, not a list of diagnoses. Our guide to who qualifies explains how it works for different kinds of condition.
No. The criteria need LCWRA from one of the Schedule 7 descriptors. DWP guidance says its health professionals must not advise them where LCWRA rests only on a "treat as" rule such as substantial risk, cancer treatment, pregnancy risk or end of life.
Then the criteria are unlikely to be met for that descriptor, because the law asks for at all times or on all occasions. LCWRA itself needs only the majority of the time, so an honest description of how often it happens still counts there.
GOV.UK says people assessed as having a severe, lifelong condition will not usually need another assessment. In law, the DWP does not assess you again for this unless there is evidence of a mistake or a relevant change in your condition (regulation 41(4) and (6)).
It is free and it works in your browser, so your answers are not sent to us. Only if you ask for the email and tick the consent box do we receive your answer codes, which we use to send you that one email. Your email address then joins our mailing list for a few follow-up emails about your claim; your answers are not added to it. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Sources

All checked on 9 October 2026.

Related guides

Who qualifies for the Severe Conditions Criteria → LCWRA and Support Group checker → LCWRA rates and the 2026 changes → How to fill in the UC50 and WCA50 →
Guidance only. This tool provides general guidance and is not legal advice or a promise of any outcome. Decisions are made by the DWP (the Department for Communities in Northern Ireland). Always describe your genuine difficulties honestly. ESAexpert is operated by a sole trader and is not affiliated with the DWP or any government body.

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