AIBU to be angry about the benefits system

Does anyone have the link for the thread re second homes and universal credit? I have a friend in a similar situation and curious as to what’s said

Sounds like a you problem , you can't be mad at the system because you didn't check and why are you moaning? if you don't need the money anyway it's a moot point

@Lifetooshort23

If you had the same circumstances as the OP you too would be eligible for UC.

@Babyroobs also forgot to add the tax credits. I mean tax free child care. Completely got the words wrong that's on me.

Ok, so I may have read this wrong.

But isn't Op saying she's entitled for universal credit?

If so that's really confusing as I know I'm not and as a family we earn the same amount each month.

I could do with a tiny extra to pay for my husband to have private medical for a diagnosis we've been struggling to get via NHS.

Sure i read somewhere that you can't get universal credits if you claim the tax free childcare though its one or the other you can't have both

I don't know! I just fiddled the calculator and if I work less hours than full time (same salary pro rata) I'm better off than working the extra day 🤯 by a lot too. Baffling.

errr what! We take home around the same, maybe less and I didn’t think we were entitled to anything?! Although we do have 30 hours free childcare when the kids have turned 3… one is at school now and one is claiming that and the youngest doesn’t get it yet but now I’m wondering if we could get more! I never for a second thought we could?! I will be checking!

You've hit the nail on the head
Years ago in london my dad aplied for a roofing grant as advised by mates - this is the days before the internet etc - went to the coucil - met by a very rude staff memeber possibly having an off day - asked day re his income etc and mortgage payems etc - as dad worked and earned above minimum wage - it was a big NO. Had he been out of work for even a short while, I think we would have got the roofing grant. Within a few months dad got a new roof paid for by self.

At times it looks like you are pensilised for earning a hlaf decent wageand dad did as he often worked 50/55 hour weeks

What, how! I’m a single parent working full time and am entitled to UC so don’t see why you wouldn’t be. Although I don’t get child maintenance.

@XenoBitch ahh okay thanks for clarifying.

Exactly my thoughts too

No, benefits are reduced when you have £6k in savings. The threshold for them being stopped altogether is £16k.

Okay but also, would your benefits not stop as soon as your savings got to £6k? So you would in fact just have 6k savings and then back to normal.

Something similar happened to me with my first child. Me and DP were working full time and I didn't realise I could claim benefits until the 2nd 2 years later when someone I worked with mentioned it. I really struggled during maternity leave with the first too. I wasn't angry at missing out though, just grateful when I was able to receive them.

It does frustrate me that so many working people need benefits if they want to have children and have a good standard of living. That standard should be available on one full time wage.

Shouldn't need benefits on that amount of earnings

Tax credits are a benefit just dressed up under the tax credits name to make it look like some kind of tax rebate rather than a benefit ! I think it was just so that the masses claiming them didn't think they were claiming benefits.

*2019 my apologies

A previous poster mentioned above about the managed mingration payment, which is great because obviously people are guaranteed to not be worse off.. however I can’t help being slightly annoyed that when I had to go from tax credits to UC in the year 2018 (practically when Covid struck) that I had to wait 6 weeks (people who had to move over around that time will also have experienced this) for any money to help with rent, the childcare element? Etc.. but now people are transitioned over and get a guarantee that they won’t be worse off?

mine and plenty of other peoples payments were on hold for 6weeks, my son nearly lost his nursery space because I couldn’t afford his slot without the childcare element, we had no money for food. We tried asking for an advanced payment which was always ignored on our journal! We was made significantly worse off..

would have been lovely to have the reassurance that we wouldn’t have been worse off so my child could still attend nursery, so I could work.. the rent had to be paid late.. a lot of bills during that 6weeks were put on hold..

the system needs to be fairer, we were a family in need back then, if they are doing managed migration now, why couldn’t they have done it back then? I nearly lost my job due to having no childcare because I couldn’t afford the childcare bill.

and before people start going “ooo you shouldn’t have children of you can’t afford them” I didn’t ask to be landed in the shit, I was working 35hrs a week, had child tax credits, help with some of the childcare costs.. which on tax credits they wouldn’t expect you to find a 1100 lump sum payment to be able to claim it back.. they’d actually help you get back into work.. husband also got made redundant during the pandemic so unfortunately we didn’t expect for him to lose his job, a new system to come into place and wait 6weeks with practically no income (bar wages which didn’t go very far) and also we lost a daughter in 2019 but they was pressuring me to find more hours literally 3months after she passed away!! So forgive me for not having a crystal ball.

its always been a system where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Indeed.

Haven’t RTWT but it seems to me that, if the OP doesn’t feel she needs whatever she could claim in benefits, she doesn’t have to claim or she could claim and donate the extra to an appropriate good cause - Food bank? Educational? Children‘s charity for the developing world?

Thanks. I just blindly believe people, which is a huge fault I have.

I do crafts (and am pretty good at them) and when I said to my work coach that I would like to sell them (to recoup material costs really... crafting helps with my mental health), then I would have to register a company and be classed as self-employed... which confuses me as you can make up to £1000 per annum in a hobby business and not have to declare or register anything with HMRC. So I am not sure how that would work with self-reporting earnings on my UC journal...

I never bothered in the end. I now have a house full of hand made stuff that gets given as gifts, or I donate to charity auctions etc.

Post by bot - designed to whip up antagonism.

UC works on your "elements". Everyone's elements is added up, then your wages are taken away from the total (essentially).

So if you had a single parent who earned 66K (take home 4K), but had 3 kids aged 7, 8 & 9, and paid £1200 a month in childcare and £1300 in rent, that person would be entitled to £1600 a month in UC. Don't come at me telling me this is ridiculous, the figures are correct and it is what it is.

If you had a single parent with who earned 66K (take home 4K) and had three kids aged 4, 8 & 9 (so one is born after the 2 child limit came into force and isn't counted), with no childcare costs at all, and £1300 a month in rent, that person would get approx £180 a month in UC. If that same person owned their house, they would get nothing.

It's not a straightforward "you earn X so you are entitled or you aren't entitled", it takes into account the ages of your kids, how many you have, your housing costs, your childcare costs, your wages etc etc.