to think most part-time workers don't know what's about to hit them?! (Universal Credit)

[aufaniae]

Do you work part-time and get Working Tax Credit or Housing Benefit?

Did you know that once you're on Universal Credit, you'll be expected to attend the Job Centre to prove that you're looking for better paid work / more hours, in much the same way as unemployed people must prove they're looking for work.

If the Job Centre find an interview for you, you will have to attend (with 48 hours notice) even if it clashes with your paid work.

If you are offered a job with more hours, or better pay than your current one, you will be obliged to take it, even if you have good reason for not wanting to e.g. it's only a temporary post (whereas your current one is permanent) / has no training & worse prospects than your current job / makes picking your children up from school impossible / requires you to travel much further / has nothing to do with the career you're following.

If you don't attend the interview and/or take the job, your UC will be sanctioned, you will lose the UC for months or even years (depending on if it's your first infraction).

You will be forced to continue "upgrading" your job until you earn the equivalent of minimum wage for 35 hours a week.

I suspect there are lots of people (e.g. parents who work part time so they can pick their kids up from school) who will be affected by this, but don't realise it yet.

More info here

I wonder if the childcare element is changing. Will that be included in the £26,000 that will be the benefits cap. I think it is very wrong that all this hasn't been made clear and stop people from worrying.

No its not included in the 26k cap as thats just for non working households.

Lazy, this has always been the case with these departments, unfortunately. It's nothing new but I suspect that in the majority of cases it runs fairly smoothly. If people working minimum hours are already looking for extra work then they will be familiar with visiting the job centre, which in my area is the same place for signing on.

You can prove a job application by way of an emailed application or certificate of posting.

When I was able to claim some CTC they stopped mine for 6 months. I was never given a reason, just that it was nothing I had done wrong so guess a cock up in their administration. If it hadn't have been for having good credit by way of a bank overdraft then this would have caused real hardship. I am not unsympathetic but everything had ran smooth for a few years with them paying the CTC correctly, of course they always said they had overpaid and I had to pay it back even with the correct information being provided.

There is a problem in a country where salaries don't cover a very basic life style and the state has to subsidise it. No wonder people are trapped on benefits you would think people working full time could afford a family home childcare and a reasonable lifestyle.

From reading the thread, it's clear that a major part of the problem is the fact that once someone starts working longer hours, or in a more challenging better paid job, the things they then lose (tax credits, free school meals, free prescriptions, dental care etc) can often mean they see little, or no, tangible advantages. And ultimately that's what matters to people. It doesn't matter if 'on paper' or 'technically' you are better off working- unless that translates into actually having more money in your pocket at the end of the month, then it's meaningless.

I believe something along the lines of a 'citizens wage' is the way forward. For example, I pay (a lot) of my monthly wages into a pension, so that when I retire, I will have extra funds on top of my state pension. If the fact that I have bothered to pay money into my pension meant that I would lose my state pension then why on gods earth would I bother paying into it? I would be being penalised for having paid into my own pension by having my state pension (for which I also pay a few hundred a month) taken away.

Surely the same principle applies with benefits? If someone is going to be only marginally, or no, better off by working longer/ harder/ in more challenging and stressful work, then where on earth is the advantage in it?

I would like to see a citizens wage which enabled everyone to have the basic necessities- food, a roof over their head etc, which everyone continues to get whether they work part time or full time. That way, without penalising people who can't find work, there would be an incentive for people who do work, and an incentive for people to increase from part time to full time work without seeing the extra money they earn just taken away.

Saving £131 per week is NOT doable even with 2 people working in NMW jobs.
So say the minimum of 35 hours for DH and 24 hours for me

6.09x35=213
6.09x24=146
That £359 not including tax paid.

Take £131 for childcare to help to cover against the cost. Take out rent, gas electric that leaves £50 for the week. So food, petrol, bus fare, dinner money, school clothes, new clothes - where is the money for that???

For this to work and families be able to make ends meet the NMW needs to be raised to at least £8p/h

janey68, this is what they are trying to ensure doesn't happen. Tax threshold are going up so you get to keep slightly more of your gross pay. State pensions will be a flat rate so you are not penalised by contributing to your own plan.

I now remember the childcare help. I was grateful to be able to claim some of my costs back. Not for the first few years though, nothing was available.

Mona, I thought UC would only require one of you to work at least 35 hours so you could stop at home and forget childcare costs.

Unfortunately scrazy its the other way round cock Ups are the norm. Ours has been cocked up 3 times so far and we only started claiming last year. Our savings were used up trying to survive long enough to find a job without claiming. The cock Ups have seriously damaged our credit rating at one point we thought we were going to be homeless.

I think people are naive if they think it is impossible to be sanctioned having done nothing wrong. With the added pressure of more signing on and tighter targets I predict illegal sanctions will increase. Of course on appeal they will be reinstated but the time taken can be enough to be left destitute after you start to default on payments. I don't want to return to being so hungry it hurts.

Scrazy thats what i thought. but someone up thread said no if one parent works then the other parent has to work 24 hours or more.

If thats the case then we better hand our notice in on our house now and split up as a family cos no way will we be able to make ends meet. we'd have to move in with parents.

I know many people claiming and I was the only one who had payments stopped so I presumed I was the exception.

Mona, I don't think it is the case. Maybe someone can clarify this for us both.

Yes hope someone can.

This is from turn2us website

^70% of up to £175 for 1 child or £300 for 2 or more children per week. It will be converted into a monthly limit for Universal Credit.

A difference will be that it will be available to all lone parents and couples, where both members work, regardless of the number of hours they work, removing the requirement to work 16 hours.

For those without earnings or other income, they will receive the basic allowance plus any additions relevant to their circumstances.

For those with earnings or other income this will need to be taken into account.^

About 90% of the people I know who are claiming have had their payments cocked up at some point. Only one brought it on themselves.

70% of up to £175 for 1 child or £300 for 2 or more children per week. It will be converted into a monthly limit for Universal Credit. A difference will be that it will be available to all lone parents and couples, where both members work, regardless of the number of hours they work, removing the requirement to work 16 hours. For those without earnings or other income, they will receive the basic allowance plus any additions relevant to their circumstances. For those with earnings or other income this will need to be taken into account.

Yes, janey, a citizens' wage or universal benefit, alongside a concerted home-building/repairing/reclaiming effort, would raise the floor to a level where nobody had to starve or be homeless. There's really no advantage to having a population that can easily be tipped into destitution, or why would developing countries be so keen to elevate their poor?

Also, as everyone keeps saying, an energetic building programme and a populace that can afford to buy basics will massage the economy into action.

When everybody can afford to live decently, they naturally start wanting more and are better placed to be able to work. So they start earning, each to their own aspirations and capabilities.

We could always break up the debt-based banking tyranny, adopting Positive Money strategies instead, or a combination of many similar common-sense-based (but radical) policies. But that'll never happen while we are governed by bankers.

The document that explains what has been decided about UC so far is here

mona lisa - i also showed how you can decrease it to £50 a week by using you allocated holiday time.
so £359-50 = £309 per week / £1236 a month. most/ many people live on that or less a month

Hear hear garlicblocks. Your sentence about 'when everybody lives decently..' sums it up. There should be a basic level at which everyone has their fundamental needs met. Following on from that , people need to see tangible advantages to working. It was a massive retrograde step IMO to introduce the rules about 16/ 24 hours which left many people realising there was very little to be gained from working harder or longer. At the end of the day, 16 hours is less than half of a full working week. The govt created a problem whereby some people feel entitled to do just that, and the thought of working a perfectly normal week is scary or alien to them

Disclaimer: I am NOT referring to people with disabilities etc etc ...

also those figures are based on full time childcare. if your only working 24 hours a week as mentioned, it will decrease in price.

those prices give you daily childcare in the holidays, not part time. work part time, you earn less, simple. work part time, your childcare is less, so its prob more like £30 a week a year.

many holiday clubs offer a reduction on each additional child also.

if dh works 35 and you worked 24, then you also swap hours around so they overlap.

if you worked mon, tues wed, thurs 6am-midday. thats 24 hours. but if dh starts work at 9.30am and leaves at say 9am. you would only need 3hrs childcare a day in holidays and none in school time. 12 hours childcare a week.

that kind of idea is how people work.

At the moment we are living on less than that. As out of work at the moment. DH is hoping to get in work by the end of this month. Fingers crossed.

I dont get what you mean? So use £50 towards childcare costrs and the £309 for rest of things :/

sorry im confused

You get cb on top of that as well though.

^Childcare costs element
You can get this if you pay for registered child care in order to stay in work. There is no set number of hours you need to work to get this element. You will get 70% of your relevant childcare costs met up to:
maximum amount for one child - £532.29
maximum amount for two or more children - £912.50
If you are part of a couple both of you must be in work unless one of you is unable to look after a child because they:
have limited capability for work or limited capability for work-related activity or
have regular and substantial caring responsibilities for a severely disabled person or are temporarily absent from your household (ie in prison/hospital/or residential care)
Generally the childcare must be provided by someone who is registered for child care or an equivalent. Relevant childcare is not care provided by a close relative, wholly or mainly in your home or care you provide as a foster carer.^

Mona - is that on tcs or uc?