Ferret Reckoners
For those complicated, frequent, specialised calculations and checks
Some of them are straightforward but lengthy, others are complex, infuriating and too easy to make mistakes with.
That's where these reckoners can come in handy. They can save a lot of time and bother when you need those, sometimes common, sometimes infrequent, bits of information to help decide about a case. You can see details of the reckoners here.
Updated to 2026 / 2027 versions on April 9th 2026..
One person's paid weekly but their partner is paid monthly. How much will Universal Credit use as earnings each month this year? What will that do to their benefit?
From the experts
Since winning the highest award in British computing in 1981, for the world's first benefit calculation system, Ferret have been the trusted leaders in technology and social welfare.
What do the Reckoners do?
They cover a wide range of things which can be needed as part of other pieces of work. That can include benefits assessments, self-employed earnings, pension's effects and many others. You can see a detailed list here
Simple and quick
Working out these kind of things can be messy and prone to error. We've taken these, often complicated rules, and broken them down into smaller and easier to understand reckoners. They usually come as part of the comprehensive help systems for our benefit, and other, calculators, but following the demand, we've brought them all together here as a stand-alone package as well.
Registration
You can register on the site, to get immediate free access to some of the reckoners. We'll never pass your details to anyone else and we'll just send you our infrequent benefits news.
Subscriptions
You can get immediate access to all the reckoners for one year with an inexpensive subscription. There are different rates for individuals, voluntary and 3rd sector organisations, and commercial or statutory bodies.
You can subscribe by clicking here
Free Access
Because of Covid-19 and the new energy and financial crisis, we made more of our reckoners free to access for a time. We're extending this because of the continuing cost of living crisis. It's a great chance to try some of them out.
You need to have registered on the site in order to access them. You can do this by registering for a free subscription here. You can see and access those free reckoners here once you've registered.
It used to take ages to work out things like notional income from pension savings. I had to search for all sorts of tables and bond rates. Now it's really quick ... and the sums are right too.