I was unable to attend an interview for a job will UC sanction me?

I can’t believe you didn’t even call to cancel.

That’s incredibly unprofessional and rude.

There are staff in reception who field messages, deal with parents, sick children to be picked up, etc.
Phone the school and explain.
Contact UC and explain.

It's much better to make sure you've updated everyone rather than to not, particularly where UC is involved.

This is ridiculous. You thought that you couldn't call the school before you even missed the interview?
I thought you had to prove these things to UC.
How many interviews have you had?

What so you'd give up a job opportunity cos your child has told school they have tummy ache?!

Sort out your priorities. There's plenty of times school call and the child is barely unwell, school wait til they have the attendance mark before ringing to say they 'look a bit peaky'.

A child's outlook and situation is going to be considerably improved by their parent being in work earning a good salary - that will far outweigh the impact of them having to wait 45-60min with their tummy ache in the school reception, 1 single time

OP won't be back. She is getting an unbelievably hard time and I think her mistake was mentioning UC. There seems to be a special level of disdain on MN reserved for people who claim benefits as evidenced by the ridiculous level of vitriol on this thread. A PP claimed her behaviour was 'disgusting' and other posters are behaving as if the OP has killed someone. She will be 'blacklisted forever' with the council. Oh the drama!

I'm sure the school had multiple candidates and will survive the OP not turning up. She's ONE candidate. It's really not that big of a deal. I've scheduled interviews for candidates in the past who didn't turn up. It's annoying but it's not the end of the world!

Surely this can't be real?

So you not only didn't show up for a job interview, but you didn't even have the common courtesy to let them know? And your excuse is that you had no way to contact them?

Firstly...nonsense. Unless you were given the time and location of the interview via telepathy, you have a contact for someone.

Secondly, you know the name of the school. Google, and call them. If you can't figure that out for yourself, I'd say you've done the school a massive favour.

You can't need a job that badly if this is how you're acting.

I have a special level of distain for people who claim benefits intended for those genuinely looking for work, while taking their job search as seriously as the Chuckle Brothers doing some roofing.

As I said above, I was in court (family court - divorce from abusive ex) when school tried to call me.
Phone was off. They call the next person on my emergency contact list and ds was collected and cared for.
I don't think running out of court to collect my son would have looked good, in fact it would be more likely to indicate I had not put things in place while I was otherwise engaged.

Not letting someone know you aren't turning up for an interview is disgusting behaviour. And i say that as someone who got half way to an interview once and had such a bad panic attack I could hardly breathe. I phoned them in tears and explained.

I have no issue with people claiming UC, I've been claiming it myself long enough! Albeit for health reasons (see previous paragraph)

"Here lies Ankhmo of Milton Keynes. To say a few words is her daughter...."

"My mum .. was never there for me, was always working. Sure we had holidays and cars and crap, but I didn't ever have a mum. When I hurt, she wasn't there to comfort me. When I cried, she was more interested in getting reports filed with her boss. When I was ill, she left me to my sickness. These are the memories I hold of her."

You're all dead soon. Not a penny you earn or a promotion you get will stop the reaper knocking your door. The only thing of value you leave behind, is a memory in the people you know.

"My mum... was always there for me. Sure we didn't have many holidays, no cars and frivolous crap, but I did always have mum. When I hurt, she was there to comfort me. When I cried, she was the first to my side and the last to leave it. When I was ill, she held me through my sickness. These are the memories I hold of her."

I agree. You should have gone to the interview. But I doubt you'll be sanctione d

Are you only going for interviews because the job centre tell you to, or do you actually want to get a job?

Schools call all the bloody time. You dont actually have to go get your child if its not possible.
I know you didnt want to call the school, but did you call the interviewers to see if it could be rearranged even?

If you had said to the school office, im not going to be able to collect her for a while as im heading to a job interview. Can you keep her in the medical room till school pick up time, sorry, Then thats what they would have done.

Most of us can manage to "be there" for our DC AND work, to say otherwise is offensive to working parents and suggests its an either/or situation.
No decent parent on getting a call from school would say "fuck it I am too busy" but its Ok to say "do I need to come right now do you think?" or "I will be there as quickly as I can"

But as far as I can tell the OP is genuinely looking for work. She set up the interview herself after all and if the school hadn't called she would have attended.

I just don't understand all the hate. Even if OP isn't trying hard enough to get a job does she really deserve 8 pages of nasty comments, including people telling her the school had a lucky escape as she would have been shit at the job anyway? This level of opprobrium seems totally unecceesary.

I've never claimed benefits and really don't have a particular issue with people who do and "don't take their job search seriously". Life on UC doesn't sound great to me so I don't envy their situation and can't get worked up about it tbh.

If she'd posted "I had a job interview but my child's school called me, so I picked her up instead and didn't even bother to let my potential future employers know", she would have got exactly the same responses. UC has nothing to do with it.

It was a job created by the council, which happens to be located at the school.

I'm curious - to those who would always drop everything because their child is sick, is there an age limit that stops being needed and what is it. OP hasn't said how old their child is. Does this apply if they're 16? What about if they're 25?

Obviously it depends how sick, but a job interview is exactly the sort of situation where I would expect a possible delay in collection. Ultimately we don't know how long it would have taken for the OP to do her interview and get to school, but unless that is more than two hours it doesn't seem unreasonable. It might frustrate the school, but I doubt two hours is that unusual and a job interview is a very good excuse!

I think you have misinterpreted what I said.

If the school calls to ask you collect your child then you do so, as soon as you are reasonably able to.

If it takes you an hour because you live an hour away - that's absolutely fine, obviously.

What I do not think is acceptable is for parents to carry on with their day, leaving their child at school to sit in an office, poorly because they appear to have better things to do with their time.

It's also not for School Office staff to care your sick child.

If my child was taken ill, requiring hospital treatment and was 6 hours away. I'd act in a reasonable and responsible manner and drive 6 hours to my child as soon as I could. I don't understand the issue here? Did you not?

I don't understand? Have you quoted the wrong person?

To me, the UC thing doesn't even come into it (other than the part about the possible sanctions).

It's just really disrespectful when someone has scheduled an hour or so of their possibly very busy job to not even give them a courtesy of a quick heads up.

If you've ever been on the hiring side it's very disappointing and somewhat frustrating, especially with how easy it is to communicate these days. There's no reason OP couldn't have got the school office number or email address off their website... although if she hadn't even looked at their website before going for the interview, it doesn't seem that she was too dedicated/bothered about getting the role anyway.

Sorry. Bullshit. I work an hour and a half away from my sons school. Even if I picked up the phone straight away and left the office immediately and all of the stars aligned and my trains and buses got me to school as quickly as possible, I still wouldn't be there before the OP potentially had time to finish her interview.

Or are you saying that all parents should work in the vicinity of their children's schools just in case?

But as far as I can tell the OP is genuinely looking for work. She set up the interview herself after all and if the school hadn't called she would have attended.

Nobody genuinely looking for a job at a school doesn't call them when they can't make an interview because A) They don't know how to and B) They're worried they might be busy with lessons.

I wouldn't accept that level of excuse from a child, let alone an adult in need of a job.

No, her mistake was saying she didn’t ‘want’ to call the school and couldn’t find a number etc etc. Had she done all that and was genuinely worried about just being sanctioned, then of course people would have assured her that she did everything she could.

I luv my kids I do.