If you are married, in a civil partnership or cohabiting the Department of Social Protection (DSP) will assess both of your means when carrying out a means test for a social assistance payment. This is the case even if only one of you is actually claiming a payment.
For some social assistance payments, the DSP adds all of your means together and then halves them to get the assessable means for each one of you. For others, the DSP adds all your means together and then assesses them against the maximum household payment for your circumstances.