The benefits trap

[nagapie]

Can someone help me help a friend. She is a single mum who has housing association property and has not worked for 3 years. She is desperate to get back into work but if she works more than 16hrs per week, she will lose her HB and be worse off.

I have been doing some job searching with her but we cannot find any jobs that offer 16hrs or less per week. We've been looking at all the supermarkets/chain stored but they all want to rota staff 4 shifts on/four shifts off, which already puts her on a minimum of 24hrs/week.

She also wanted to do a childcare course but there is nothing funded so she could never afford to spend the initial outlay for the course, first aid cert, etc.

Any recommendations on how she could access funding for courses that lead to real employment or how to find a job where she can work shorter hours?

 

[Argonia]

No advice but good luck

 

[ash]

Hi nagapie
I'm surprised that she can't find a funded course. I do some work at CIty Lit and for its courses they say:

This course is FREE if one of the following applies:

a) You are employed and earn less than £19,890. You need to have lived in the UK or EU for the last 3 years and be a citizen of the UK or a country within the EU. You may also be eligible for this funding in other circumstances. When you come for assessment or enrolment, bring a pay slip dated within 3 months of the course start date, or a current employment contract that shows your gross salary.

Or

b) You are either on Jobseekers' Allowance or Employment & Support Allowance (WRAG). Please bring proof of income to your assessment or enrolment.

Or

c) You receive other state benefits (including Universal Credit), earn less than £338 a month (individual claims) or £541 a month (household claims) and are doing the course to become employed or move into more sustainable employment.

Call 020 7831 7831 for more information. read less

However they don't offer childcare courses that I'm aware of and maybe this funding does not apply to childcare.

I'm not sure how academic she feels but Morley College, where I also do some work, have an HND in social and community work and there is even a maintenance allowance. This would be supported by an advance learner loan which would not be payable until she is earning over a certain amount I can't remember if it's £21,000 or higher. When you start repaying the amount is nominal. Thinking about it childcare courses are also likely to be funded through an ALL as well. It's organised through the student loan company.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

but if she works more than 16hrs per week, she will lose her HB and be worse off.

I am increasingly out of touch with the benefits system, but I am not entirely sure this is right.

I understand that job seekers' allowance cuts off if you do more than 16 hours a week, but there are working tax credits (or their equivalent under universal credit) which may be claimable if you're on a low income.

When I did housing benefits (which was now quite a long time ago) it was based on a calculation involving your rent, your household circumstances, and your income. how many hours you worked, and whether that income was from work, benefits, or a combination of both, wasn't relevant. It also was not an 'all or nothing' thing - if your income was at the level of income support for your household circumstances, you'd get your full rent paid by HB. If your income went above that level, your HB (and council tax benefit) would reduce but you would never be worse off overall. (I think the system was that if your HB entitlement was down to a few pence a week, it wouldn't be paid)

The theory of the system (which may have some exceptions in practice) is that you should never end up worse off through working, although to be frank, you will end up not a lot better off, and that's before you get in to the realms of travel costs. last time i went in to this, the 'disregard' (i.e. the amount of earnings from a job that's not taken in to account for the calculation) was £ 5 a week, and that level had been set at a time when you could spend less than £ 5 a week on bus fares to the average job.

And then of course there's possible child care costs / child tax credits which I don't really understand.

I have not really got the hang of the whole universal credit thing (and from what i gather, neither has everyone who's trying to run the whole damn clusterfuck) but the official line is that you should never be worse off by getting a job.

I would suggest a play with the (anonymous and independent) benefits calculator on the turn2us website, and bung in a few possible situations (e.g. wages on offer from jobs that friend has seen) and see what it comes up with.

 

[Grace Johnson]

Had your friend been transferred to universal credit yet?

If not I would advise proceeding with very extreme care. Any changes to any benefit claim at the moment trigger a reassessment under universal credit and payments will be made according to the universal credit rules. You also lose something called mandatory transitional protection. That is the law that means if you move over to universal credit because it is forced because they are moving everyone in your area over your payments shouldn't fall under there current level. If you change the claim you lose this protection. If you can avoid doing it until the whole area is moved over you should 100 percent be doing that. Any changes in benefit claims at the moment have the potential to cause a horrendous drop income. Do not do it regardless of what the benefits office tell you.

This has already been absolutely disastrous for many people. Lot of people have been made homeless and many mor living in dire poverty because of it.

Regarding courses, most colleges offer an access to higher learning programme for adults which takes a year. There are loads of different subjects to study and over the year the aim is to get a place at university the following year so there is a lot of support with that too.

The cost is about 3k but you will get a loan for that that will be paid back under traditional student loan rules meaning nothing will get paid until the course is finished and then only from a salary over a certain amount.

This might a great way forward.

 

[Pickman's model]

Can someone help me help a friend. She is a single mum who has housing association property and has not worked for 3 years. She is desperate to get back into work but if she works more than 16hrs per week, she will lose her HB and be worse off.

I have been doing some job searching with her but we cannot find any jobs that offer 16hrs or less per week. We've been looking at all the supermarkets/chain stored but they all want to rota staff 4 shifts on/four shifts off, which already puts her on a minimum of 24hrs/week.

She also wanted to do a childcare course but there is nothing funded so she could never afford to spend the initial outlay for the course, first aid cert, etc.

Any recommendations on how she could access funding for courses that lead to real employment or how to find a job where she can work shorter hours?

Keep an eye on any academic libraries nearby, to see if shelve posts going. These generally part-time, could easily be just a couple of hours a day, can lead on to library assistant work. Pay at least in London £10+/hour. Possibility of training she'd like like first aid. These jobs come up regularly but a speculative approach likely to lead at least to bring told when ads going out. Very possible to find 12.5h/week job also poss of extra hours. Will post up when I see this sort of thing advertised.

 

[ash]

Just checked and you don't start paying the loan until you are earning over twenty five thousand. Also Morley College website says

Fee Remission for Level 3 courses
If you're under 24 years old and have never completed a Level 3 course previously, your course could be free. Contact our Student Services team by emailing enquiries@morleycollege.ac.uk, or by phone on 020 7450 1889, for more information on how to apply.

Some childcare courses are Level three and Morley do have some childcare and teaching courses so my be worth looking at that.

Also children's centres and school often deliver courses such as first aid and employability related courses for parents I know that City Lit used to is this in partnership with community learning in Lambeth.

 

[Thimble Queen]

.

 

[nagapie]

No, she's dyslexic.

 

[nagapie]

Hi nagapie
I'm surprised that she can't find a funded course. I do some work at CIty Lit and for its courses they say:

This course is FREE if one of the following applies:

a) You are employed and earn less than £19,890. You need to have lived in the UK or EU for the last 3 years and be a citizen of the UK or a country within the EU. You may also be eligible for this funding in other circumstances. When you come for assessment or enrolment, bring a pay slip dated within 3 months of the course start date, or a current employment contract that shows your gross salary.

Or

b) You are either on Jobseekers' Allowance or Employment & Support Allowance (WRAG). Please bring proof of income to your assessment or enrolment.

Or

c) You receive other state benefits (including Universal Credit), earn less than £338 a month (individual claims) or £541 a month (household claims) and are doing the course to become employed or move into more sustainable employment.

Call 020 7831 7831 for more information. read less

However they don't offer childcare courses that I'm aware of and maybe this funding does not apply to childcare.

I'm not sure how academic she feels but Morley College, where I also do some work, have an HND in social and community work and there is even a maintenance allowance. This would be supported by an advance learner loan which would not be payable until she is earning over a certain amount I can't remember if it's £21,000 or higher. When you start repaying the amount is nominal. Thinking about it childcare courses are also likely to be funded through an ALL as well. It's organised through the student loan company.

Thanks. I'll get her to look at that. There may be courses but we can't find them.

 

[Argonia]

Has she asked the Jobcentre about courses? Mostly they're fucking useless but they did get me on a proofreading course which was fully funded by them.

 

[nagapie]

I am increasingly out of touch with the benefits system, but I am not entirely sure this is right.

I understand that job seekers' allowance cuts off if you do more than 16 hours a week, but there are working tax credits (or their equivalent under universal credit) which may be claimable if you're on a low income.

When I did housing benefits (which was now quite a long time ago) it was based on a calculation involving your rent, your household circumstances, and your income. how many hours you worked, and whether that income was from work, benefits, or a combination of both, wasn't relevant. It also was not an 'all or nothing' thing - if your income was at the level of income support for your household circumstances, you'd get your full rent paid by HB. If your income went above that level, your HB (and council tax benefit) would reduce but you would never be worse off overall. (I think the system was that if your HB entitlement was down to a few pence a week, it wouldn't be paid)

The theory of the system (which may have some exceptions in practice) is that you should never end up worse off through working, although to be frank, you will end up not a lot better off, and that's before you get in to the realms of travel costs. last time i went in to this, the 'disregard' (i.e. the amount of earnings from a job that's not taken in to account for the calculation) was £ 5 a week, and that level had been set at a time when you could spend less than £ 5 a week on bus fares to the average job.

And then of course there's possible child care costs / child tax credits which I don't really understand.

I have not really got the hang of the whole universal credit thing (and from what i gather, neither has everyone who's trying to run the whole damn clusterfuck) but the official line is that you should never be worse off by getting a job.

I would suggest a play with the (anonymous and independent) benefits calculator on the turn2us website, and bung in a few possible situations (e.g. wages on offer from jobs that friend has seen) and see what it comes up with.

She has a problem with her housing. She is housed by Nottinghill Trust but her property costs £1200 per month. As soon as she starts earning, she has to start paying this but the rent is unaffordable. She has tried to swap housing but it's not been possible as Nottinghill won't rehouse her, the LEA will consider she made herself homeless if she leaves and she can't afford deal with private housing for various reasons. She has tried a house swap but no other housing association residents want the burden of her rent. Before she has ended up massive arrears because she was working and got ill after a surgery and was liable for thousands of pounds of rent before she could sort it out.

 

[nagapie]

Has she asked the Jobcentre about courses? Mostly they're fucking useless but they did get me on a proofreading course which was fully funded by them.

Yes, they keep sending her on useless ones like doing her CV. Most jobs she's applying for don't even want a CV, they have online forms.

 

[Argonia]

£12,000 per month? Fucking hell so that's £144,000 per year?

 

[Puddy_Tat]

She has a problem with her housing. She is housed by Nottinghill Trust but her property costs £12 000 per month. As soon as she starts earning, she has to start paying this but the rent is unaffordable. She has tried to swap housing but it's not been possible as Nottinghill won't rehouse her, the LEA will consider she made herself homeless if she leaves and she can't afford deal with private housing for various reasons. She has tried a house swap but no other housing association residents want the burden of her rent. Before she has ended up massive arrears because she was working and got ill after a surgery and was liable for thousands of pounds of rent before she could sort it out.

Something here does not make a great deal of sense.

Is she getting housing benefit for the full rent at the moment, or is there some sort of weird tenancy agreement where the rent goes up a ludicrous amount (and presumably well over the benefits cap - not sure if the 'local housing allowance' rates apply to housing association tenancies) if she starts working? That would seem to be fairly bizarre behaviour on the part of the housing association...

 

[8115]

I'm assuming she means £1200?

 

[ShiftyBagLady]

...

 

[ShiftyBagLady]

Has she used one if the online benefits calculators to see how much/many other benefits she might be entitled to? If she's still in a working tax credit area she might be better off but she should get some proper advice or do lots of research about this.
Where you live

The NHS often have part time admin workers, there's a website, imaginatively called nhsjobs which she might like to look at.

 

[nagapie]

I'm assuming she means £1200?

Woops, yes.

 

[nagapie]

Has she used one if the online benefits calculators to see how much/many other benefits she might be entitled to? If she's still in a working tax credit area she might be better off but she should get some proper advice or do lots of research about this.
Where you live

The NHS often have part time admin workers, there's a website, imaginatively called nhsjobs which she might like to look at.

Thanks. I will tell her to double check. I'm not sure she feels comfortable with admin type jobs due to her level of literacy. Reading is fine but writing not so much. Tbh she just wants to pack shelves at night.

 

[nagapie]

Something here does not make a great deal of sense.

Is she getting housing benefit for the full rent at the moment, or is there some sort of weird tenancy agreement where the rent goes up a ludicrous amount (and presumably well over the benefits cap - not sure if the 'local housing allowance' rates apply to housing association tenancies) if she starts working? That would seem to be fairly bizarre behaviour on the part of the housing association...

I imagine at £1 200 her rent is above the housing benefits cap but the Nottinghill Trust say they won't cover the difference, reduce the rent or rehouse her as they are only required to offer the accommodation at a 30% reduced rate to the normal market and we live in the Brixton area, which is now very expensive.

 

[nagapie]

Thanks for all the responses. I will go through them with her when she comes over next week. Right now, however, it looks like any changes would initiate universal credit so she's fucked. But maybe we can find a course she can go on that is funded.

 

[Thimble Queen]

.

 

[ash]

Yes, they keep sending her on useless ones like doing her CV. Most jobs she's applying for don't even want a CV, they have online forms.

Omg there are so many crap courses like that out there

 

[ShiftyBagLady]

...

 

[purenarcotic]

HB shouldn’t cut out immediately but should be staggered and reassessed - I am surprised she’s getting full HB on such a high rent rate but I’m in Brum so the LHA is probably higher in London.

Has she looked at jobs in schools? There are a lot of jobs up here for playground cover or ‘play workers’ - it’s often only a few hours a week so should keep her under the threshold.

Turn2us have an excellent benefits calculator which you could use with her to have a mess around by changing the hours of work etc to see what she would be entitled to. There are also benefit calculators which will tell you exactly how much HB you can get (have a look on her LA website, Brum has one specifically for HB and council tax) which again could be used to have a play around with.

This shouldn’t trigger a change to UC as she’s within the same LA and wouldn’t be making a new claim (I could be wrong on this I don’t have my UC stuff to hand) - the jobcentre are crap at understanding UC regulations though. A visit to CAB or a law centre may be really useful in helping to determine exactly what her rights would be.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

I do wonder if someone has misunderstood something here (i accept it might be me)

While housing benefit will get stopped if someone comes off income support (the DWP will tell local council that X person's income support has stopped as from Y date) that does not automatically mean they are no longer entitled to some housing benefit.

The administrative procedure will vary locally, but generally speaking you need to report a change of circumstances to local council, and provide proof of (new) income. In practice this usually means you report change of circumstances one week then go back a week or two later with pay slips. The sooner you do this the better, and it stops there being a gap between HB entitlement based on income support and entitlement based on wages.

If you just wait for DWP to inform council (it can take a while, especially if you're on the edge of a borough - when I worked in housing benefits, the DSS (as then was) computer was not good at coping with the fact that postcodes and borough boundaries didn't quite match, so council i worked for tended to get notifications for a few streets in neighbouring borough and vice versa) then council will say your claim ended on Y date, anything they have paid you since then is an 'overpayment' and they would like it back please, and any new claim will generally only start from after it's put in, so there will be a gap where no HB is payable and you are unlikely to get 'back dating' to fill that gap.

I imagine at £1 200 her rent is above the housing benefits cap but the Nottinghill Trust say they won't cover the difference, reduce the rent or rehouse her as they are only required to offer the accommodation at a 30% reduced rate to the normal market and we live in the Brixton area, which is now very expensive.

I don't get it - if current situation (i'm assuming full level of income support + full rent as HB) is within the benefits cap, then lower level of benefits (possibly tax credits + part of rent as HB) is going to be less.

You've said friend is a single mum. This is Gingerbread's page on the benefits cap - it also appears from a linked page that the benefits cap doesn't apply if you're working 16 hours or more a week. They also have a helpline that may be worth a call.

This shouldn’t trigger a change to UC as she’s within the same LA and wouldn’t be making a new claim

from a HB perspective, I'm inclined to agree, but would this set of circumstances mean changing from (again, i'm assuming here) income support to tax credits - and would that trigger a change on to UC?

 

[nagapie]

Thanks, purenarcotic and Puddy_Tat , I don't know the exact details of her housing, I think she's afraid of becoming liable for some of the rent as it's so much. She has only just come out of years of arrears from when she was working but fell ill due to major surgery.
I'll remind her about school jobs. I think she has no confidence hence wanting to pack shelves as no public interface.
In fact she is very talented in many practical areas like special effects make up but no formal qualifications and unable to start at the bottom due to her parenting committment.

 

[Grace Johnson]

HB shouldn’t cut out immediately but should be staggered and reassessed - I am surprised she’s getting full HB on such a high rent rate but I’m in Brum so the LHA is probably higher in London.

Has she looked at jobs in schools? There are a lot of jobs up here for playground cover or ‘play workers’ - it’s often only a few hours a week so should keep her under the threshold.

Turn2us have an excellent benefits calculator which you could use with her to have a mess around by changing the hours of work etc to see what she would be entitled to. There are also benefit calculators which will tell you exactly how much HB you can get (have a look on her LA website, Brum has one specifically for HB and council tax) which again could be used to have a play around with.

This shouldn’t trigger a change to UC as she’s within the same LA and wouldn’t be making a new claim (I could be wrong on this I don’t have my UC stuff to hand) - the jobcentre are crap at understanding UC regulations though. A visit to CAB or a law centre may be really useful in helping to determine exactly what her rights would be.

Any changes to any benefit claim trigger a universal credit assessment at the moment. Even just a change of address with no change of circumstances.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

Any changes to any benefit claim trigger a universal credit assessment at the moment. Even just a change of address with no change of circumstances.

Does transferring to UC result in the expectation you can live on sod all (and pay the rent) for 5 weeks like a new claim does?