Ive Just shopped someone for benefit fraud, do I deserve to burn in hell.

[Gulitladen]

I feel quite bad.

This person is an acquaintance, She was a single parent for a few months, then she met someone who pretty much moved in, he was paying her bills for her and moved in properly earlier this year.

She has always worked full time with a salary of around 20k.

She seems to have an awful lot of money, and, as a single parent myself, I couldnt quite work it out. However, I have seen her tax credits renewal form as she didnt understand something and asked me to have a look for her, and shes claiming to be a lone parent, working 16.3 hours a week, earning 12k a year less than she actually is.

She is also claiming housing benefit as a single parent.

So, I have completed the DWP form and sent it off. I couldnt help it, it makes me see red.

But I now feel terrible.

Thanks for the response :)

I was just wondering - if it was only a few weeks/couple of months afterwards, your pride would've been misplaced, as her benefits would've been stopped pending investigation - so despite not knowing if she was guilty or not, they would've stopped them completely.

Of course, that's not to say that feeling proud of reporting someone based on unproven assumptions is anything to feel proud about in any event.

Nah I'd much rather think for myself thanks :) just because my opinion differs from others doesn't mean I have to get my kicks thinking up silly jokes. I am astounded that people who support the law are so looked down upon here.

Oh, I wouldn't be too worried about having Happy on my facebook. Even if I did a status update saying "Feeling blessed - just collected my £eleventy-million payment in Tax Credits despite earning shit-loads and being married to five men at the same time haha at all you suckers" she'd probably be straight on the phone to report me to HMV (well, they sound the same, pretty much, don't they - what the fuck, just do it) and I could continue coining it in while sending my children out to pickpocket the great and good while she and Gerard mash their heads into the keyboards and accidentally delete themselves from my news feed.

HMV sounds about right, there was another goady benefits poster on here recently ranting about people receiving DVLA.

Ahh yes. Good old H and the DVLA.

Oh yeah, Smuggy 'Ere, I wonder if Happy and the FB stalker are the same person?

Look, whether you think the OP is bu or not, can we PLEASE stop with this complete rubbish about benefit fraud affecting what other 'more deserving' people get?

It doesn't work that way, ok?

Yes, some people do defraud the system. They usually defraud it for pretty small amounts but that's neither here nor there really, benefit fraud does happen.

However, the fact is that it accounts for less than 1% of the benefits bill. And even if you think that 1% is too much, you still need to understand that that 1% makes absolutely no difference whatsoever to the level of benefits other people receive.

Cuts are not happening because of benefit fraud. Deserving people are not losing out because of fraud. They're just not.

Divide and rule, divide and rule. Pretty fucking sad, really,

How do you know she was claiming HB 'as a single parent' OP? My husband and I claimed HB, and he was working.

However, the fact is that it accounts for less than 1% of the benefits bill

Not only that- it's dwarfed by the 16 million pounds worth of benefits that go unclaimed every year.

I couldnt do this,and i wouldnt want to be friends with someone who could.

You dont know her situation.

plus the points above about fraud claims being tiny.

How on earth would anyone know so much about an "acquaintance's" financial/private affairs? How much she earns, how much WFTC and HB she gets, etc. I don't even know that info about my mates, and wouldn't want to know either!

OP you're either a massive snoop.. the kind of person a mate couldn't turn their back on for 1 minute or you'd be rifling thru their handbag/bedroom draws/phone to suss out info for the nosey hell of it or you're bored, telling porkies and assuming a mantle of glory for the afternoon to while away a few hours.

are you sure you aren't just jealous of the holidays handbags new stuff etc etc

leftyloony I worked 3 jobs to avoid the benefits trap at one point in my life. I was made homeless at 17 and started working full time to secure a roof over my head. At one point my working hours were 6am till 9am cleaning, 11-4 in a little coffee shop and 8 till 1am in a pub glad collecting.

I have saved enough money through hard work to manage any shortfalls, I now work full time 40plus hours a week, once my child is born I will return to said job to continue to provide for my child.

I don't believe other people should pay my way when I am perfectly capable of earning. I have no disability or health issue, I am a able bodied person and therefore earn my way in this world.

I never have turned to the benefits system for myself and I never will, I rather be destitute than be caught in the trap, because once your on that hamster wheel of benefits there's no getting back off easily.

Agree completely teaandthorazine - the budget isn't worked out like that. If it were to do with an allocated finite amount of money that was distributed equally to all claimants, then under the Labour govt when wages were (relatively) higher than now (so less need for Tax Credits, HB etc) and unemployment was a third of what it is now (so less need for JSA), benefits didn't go up. You didn't get more money for being on the dole just because there were fewer of you. It's actually quite a bit more complex than that.

Also agree with you that most fraud is for fairly small amounts, in the grand scheme of things, and most fraud is a kind of creeping process - you know, you get a couple of days' work here and there, you don't report it to the DWP if you're on the dole, because they'll just stop your JSA and HB and then it takes weeks to get it back again, and that's the only income you've got. So you stay schtum. The work gets a bit more regular, you get a few more hours each week, and maybe a month later you're earning enough to sign off. But hang on, you can't, because you have to tell them who your 'new' employer is, and HB will want to see your 'first' two wage slips, which will show that you've already been earning, and how much, and then you're frauding. So you carry on frauding, praying to God you don't get caught. And eventually you do, at the point where those few little lies at the beginning have snowballed into one massive fuck-off lie, and you're facing prosecution, and court, and having your name dragged through the mud.

That is the typical trajectory of your average benefit fraudster. If anyone really thinks that such a person deserves to have the book thrown at them, with all of the consequences that carries, well, I guess you can just knock yourself out - it's easy enough to do. I, personally, couldn't do it.

Her life is full of handbags and shoes....

you sound rather bitter.

I couldn't care less if someones life was full of hand bags and shoes and you do not know how she got her money at all.

I know a few single mums who moved someone in and sadly not one relationship has lasted.

There is something very Wild Swans/North Korean esq, communist about all these posts snitching on each other and reporting.

Boudica what are you talking about

What trap?

'Evening everyone. Sorry to butt in, but can we just give you a nod in the directions of our Talk Guidelines www.mumsnet.com/info/netiquette? We don't want to zap posts if we can help it as we then get threads with whopping great chunks missing. This is clearly an emotive subject for many, but if we can avoid personal attacks, that would be mucho appreciated.

It's my pepersonal opinion, I view the benefits system as a trap. Young people straight out of school sign on then they get houses and money. They probably do want to work but if they work they loose more than they gain, so are then forced between choosing there home over a 20hour a week paid job. Obviously they choose to keep their home.

For me it's a trap, you get stuck. It's why I refused to be a part of it at 17.

The benefits trap is a well known phenomenon, its about being caught in a place where you want to earn more, but you are better off in benefits. Its a very difficult place to be.

I was the same. Worked multiple jobs etc.
Then disability happened.
It could to you.

Of course, yes, all those houses that get doled out to the feckless.

You can't claim HB until you are 25 so how does that work then?