Consultation outcome

Design of the Compensation Scheme and Common Questions

Updated 14 April 2026

Design of the Compensation Scheme

The Infected Blood Compensation Scheme (‘the Scheme’) is set out in law and the Infected Blood Compensation Authority (IBCA) has been making compensation payments to people since December 2024. Some elements of the existing compensation scheme are important to understand, because they affect how we have been able to make changes in response to what we heard through this consultation.

In this document, we explain the principles that underpinned the design of the Scheme. There are three areas that are particularly relevant: the compensation amounts; the overall ethos and intent of the Scheme and the operational design of the Scheme.

Our aim has always been to ensure that the scope of the Scheme and the delivery of compensation is grounded in fairness, dignity and recognition of the suffering caused by the infected blood scandal, which these principles help us to achieve. We want to make sure that any changes we make to the Scheme following the consultation do not risk changing these underlying principles, or slowing down the delivery of compensation. 

1. Compensation amounts 

Holistic Recognition of Loss

Compensation is calculated across five different categories, called ‘Categories of Award’, to reflect the varied impact of the scandal and the effect it will have had on people themselves, their relationships, and their loved ones:

1. Injury Award: For physical and mental injury and emotional distress
2. Social Impact Award: For the stigma and social isolation people endured
3. Autonomy Award: For interference with private life and loss of opportunity
4. Care Award: To cover past and future care needs
5. Financial Loss Award: For loss of earnings and other financial impacts

Changes to the Scheme as a result of this consultation do not change these award categories or what they compensate people for. We have heard that some people are unclear about what exactly each category of award covers. They are particularly uncertain about what, therefore, their core route compensation covers and does not cover. We have set this out in more detail, where relevant, in the consultation response document.

Severity-based compensation and the Supplementary Route

Rather than requiring everyone to prove exactly what happened to them, the Scheme uses a severity-based banding system for infected people. Higher levels of infection severity result in higher levels of compensation, ensuring that the most impacted receive a corresponding award. 

While the tariffs are designed to address most situations, we recognise that individuals with exceptional circumstances may find that the core compensation route does not fully reflect their specific experience.The supplementary route is primarily for care and financial loss, as these are the areas where it is possible that the core route does not account for exceptional cases. 

Some of the changes we are making to the compensation scheme as a result of this consultation impact the compensation on offer through the core route. Others impact the compensation on offer through the supplementary route, or add more options to the supplementary route that previously did not exist. It continues to allow people to show that a health condition had a particularly severe impact on their life, or their earnings were higher or their care costs higher. In each case, these experiences are given compensation based on the effect they had on people’s earning capacity or their care requirements.

Flexibility of the Scheme and ability to return to the Scheme

The Scheme provides people with compensation for the wrong done to them, as well as the expected financial loss and care across someone’s lifetime (in other words, the loss they have experienced in the past, as well as the loss they can expect to experience in the future as a result of their infection). This is different to ongoing regular payments from the Infected Blood Support Schemes (IBSS) which were originally developed to help people with the ongoing day-to-day costs of living with an infection. 

Providing compensation for future needs means that the vast majority of claimants should not need to return to IBCA for more compensation in the future. However there will be some occasions in which someone’s health will change. Infected people can therefore return for reassessment if their condition worsens, or if they develop a new severe health condition and therefore need additional compensation to reflect the full impact of what has happened to them. 

The Scheme offers applicants to decide to take their compensation as either a lump sum or a series of regular payments (instalments) over a 5, 10 or 25 year period (uprated annually in line with CPI). This means they will receive an award that reflects their past and future needs, if that is what works best for their circumstances. We have not made changes that would change someone’s ability to do this as a result of this consultation.

Non-penalisation and financial security

We understand how important it is that people can receive compensation without any changes to the existing financial support they have received, if that is what they choose. The preservation of existing awards means that any previous ex-gratia payments or money received through the IBSS will not be deducted from the final compensation settlement someone receives. 

To further protect the value of these awards, all payments are exempt from Income Tax, Capital Gains Tax and Inheritance Tax. This protection extends to the estate through an IHT credit and flexible gifting rules which means that eligible recipients can pass on the value of the compensation following their own death without an IHT charge. Furthermore, receiving compensation will not adversely affect an individual’s eligibility for means-tested benefits. Finally the Scheme offers flexibility in how funds are managed, allowing applicants to choose between receiving a single lump sum or a series of periodic instalments over a 5, 10 or 25 year period to best suit their long-term financial needs. In line with the Infected Blood Inquiry’s recommendation, legal fees and financial advice costs are also covered, if someone would like this type of support with their claim.

It is important that people can continue to receive compensation without it having a negative effect on other forms of financial support they may have received before, or may need in the future. Our response to this consultation does not impact this. 

2. Ethos and Intent of the Scheme

Recognition of Historical Injustice

The infected blood scandal is an injustice that has spanned decades on an unprecedented scale: thousands have died, and sadly continue to die every week. Lives have been shattered, and justice denied. We recognise that no amount of money can make up for this suffering. 

We hope that the Scheme is able to bring redress to people who have been impacted by this harrowing scandal and who have waited for many years for recognition for what has happened to them. One of the ways we can best achieve this is by making sure IBCA are able to continue making compensation payments without undue delay.

Inquiry-led Design

The Scheme responds directly to and is in line with the recommendations made by the Infected Blood Inquiry, chaired by Sir Brian Langstaff and The Scheme design has also been informed by Sir Robert Francis KC’s compensation framework study and his recommendations to government, based on feedback from the community. It is also informed by the advice of the Infected Blood Inquiry Response Expert Group and the Technical Expert Group. 

We think it is important that the Scheme, as a whole, continues to respond and implement these recommendations. It is also so that the Scheme is based on expert advice, including clinical evidence, and can therefore continue to compensate most people for the experiences they had of infected blood.

Recognition of People Infected and People Affected

The Scheme pays compensation to all victims of the infected blood scandal. This includes:

• Infected people: Those who contracted HIV, Hepatitis B, and/or Hepatitis C through NHS-supplied blood, blood products or tissue, including those infected through Armed Forces treatment overseas.
• Affected people: Compensation is an individual entitlement for eligible partners, parents, children, siblings and carers.
• Deceased infected people: Where an eligible infected person has passed away, their personal representatives may apply. This ensures that the lives cut short due to the scandal are still recognised through their estates.

The Scheme pays compensation to all victims of the infected blood scandal in their own right.  We think it is important to make decisions about the Scheme that mean victims can continue to claim in their own right without, for example, having their own compensation value remain uncertain until someone else’s claim is settled. 

3. Operational Design

Tariff-based core route

The Scheme uses tariffs to ensure that compensation can be paid to most victims as quickly as possible and without further delays. In short, tariffs are fixed, predetermined amounts of money that vary based on a range of factors, such as the severity of someone’s infection.

The use of tariffs follows the recommendation made by the Infected Blood Inquiry. The tariffs in the Scheme have been calculated using a range of clinical and legal advice. This is to make sure the amount of money set for each tariff has been calculated to best reflect the experience people had, for example due to a specific infection. The use of set amounts for different experiences means that the amount and type of evidence people need to provide for their core route compensation claim is as straightforward as possible.

The core route is designed in a way that means it will award appropriate levels of compensation. We hope that the way awards are calculated means that people receive an amount of compensation that reflects their personal circumstances while at the same time avoiding long and intrusive assessments. It may be that two people with quite different circumstances and experiences end up receiving the same tariff amounts. This is because the tariff amounts have been specifically calculated to cover as wide a range of experiences as possible.

In exceptional cases where awards under the core route do not sufficiently reflect a person’s circumstances, a supplementary route is available. 

Minimal burden for applicants

We recognise that many in the community have faced significant hardships, including the loss or destruction of vital records. With this in mind, the application process has been designed to prioritise sensitivity and respect. People applying will not be cross-examined by claims managers, or asked to provide unreasonable amounts of evidence. Where we can justify giving people compensation with minimal or no additional evidence, we have done so. By using a tariff-based core route, we use existing clinical markers to automate much of the assessment, minimising the need for applicants to provide traumatic proof of their history. The Scheme uses the concept of ‘balance of probabilities’ rather than a stricter standard that would be expected to be provided in court. In other words, people only have to show that it was more likely than not that something happened to them.

We think it is important that the changes we are making to the Scheme as a result of this consultation continue to place the minimum burden possible on applicants. That is why we have avoided making changes that would lead to complicated or lengthy assessment processes, or require volumes of evidence that it may not be possible for anyone to provide.

Independence

Compensation is delivered through IBCA, an arms-length body. IBCA operates with its own management, staff and budget to ensure the day-to-day decision-making is independent from the Government. This means IBCA is able to make payments without requiring any case-by-case approval from Ministers. The policy that underpins IBCA was heavily informed by an Expert Group and Technical Expert Group that included external legal, clinical and actuarial specialists.

In line with the Infected Blood Inquiry’s recommendation, the Scheme provides support for legal support and financial advice. To ensure accountability and fairness any applicant who disagrees with a decision made by IBCA can initiate an internal review, and has the right to take their case to the First-tier Tribunal, administered by HM Courts and Tribunals Service.

None of the changes we are making to the Scheme following this consultation impact IBCA’s independence.

Common Questions

We recognise that the Scheme is complex and technical. Some respondents to the consultation had questions about how the Scheme works, and wanted assurance that the Scheme would take certain factors into account.

• CPI uplifting on periodic/IBSS payments: To note, these responses are different from wider concerns over interest and indexing. These responses called for periodic and IBSS payments to be uprated each year against the CPI. This provision is already in place in the Infected Blood Compensation Scheme regulations (60.7). Uprating of payments happens yearly on 1 April, against the previous September’s CPI rate. This means that payments are always in line with inflation.
• Treatment of affected victims: Some respondents were concerned that a change needed to be made so that the psychological trauma that affected people faced was properly compensated. They explained this was in part because affected children over 18 and in full time education do not receive compensation for the impact the infection had on their autonomy. Provisions are already in place to compensate for trauma (for example, through the Injury award). To be eligible for compensation as an affected child, the affected person must have been under the age of 18 and living with the infected parent for at least one year at the time of the parent’s infection (or when the parent later became infected, provided the child was cared for by the parent for a minimum period of 12 months in childhood). If a person met those criteria as a child, they are eligible for the Autonomy award regardless of whether they are now over 18 or in full-time education.
• Eligibility criteria for estates: Several respondents believe that the Scheme has imposed an “arbitrary” cut-off date (21 May 2024) for the estates of people who have sadly passed away before they were able to claim their compensation. There is no 2024 cut off for the estates of deceased infected people; if a person was eligible as an infected person but sadly died, their personal representatives can apply for compensation regardless of how long ago the death occurred. The 21 May 2024 date is relevant only to affected people who would have been eligible to claim in their own right but sadly died before they could receive payment. Estates of affected people are able to claim compensation if the affected person passed away between 21 May 2024 and 31 March 2031. 
• Evidencing a reduction in work for Financial Loss awards: A few respondents were concerned that people must provide specific evidence of a reduced inability to work in order to apply for a Financial Loss award. All eligible infected people receive core financial loss compensation, which is based on set amounts that consider when an application was started and how long a healthy person their age would be expected to live to, their ability to work after they were infected, and how long their illness had an effect on their ability to work. They do not need to provide any evidence that they could not work to receive this compensation. Where someone’s losses go beyond what is provided for in the core tariffs, the exceptional financial loss supplementary route is available for infected people and their estates. We will update the Compensation Scheme Explainer publication to ensure that information about the scheme tariffs, eligibility and evidence requirements are as clear and accessible as possible. 
• Care awards for the deceased: Responses highlighted a concern that awards for care are received by people who did not experience the injury or trauma that the award is intended to recognise. Whilst the Care award is only provided to people making a claim as an infected person or as their estate representative, if someone provided care to an infected person, and is not otherwise eligible for compensation in relation to that person (for example, as their sibling or parent), they may be eligible for compensation as an affected carer.