Here is my total income as a lone parent on benefits.

[HereBeHubbubs]

Inspired by a thread which is glorifying us lone parents as 'rolling in it', I'm prepared to declare my benefits income. It's not gauche to do so, because it's your money after all (looks at taxpayers), and you should probably know that I am also grateful for this support, prepad to pay back into the pool when working again, and am not extravagant nor consider this a 'lifestyle choice'.

I don't have Sky, a plasma tele, holidays, credit or catalogue accounts, smoke, drink and rarely socialise due to childcare issues. I buy all our clothes from charity shops. I do however have a concession rate council leisure centre swim membership of £18 a month and a £10 rolling contract mobile phone, with a phone somebody gave me.

I am terrible at budgeting and have been living on a £500 overdraft for at least the last couple of years - I never have enough income to return the account into the black, so I'm generally always at least £400 overdrawn.

My utilities are on prepayment meters currently eating up old debt weekly and a not competitive tariff.

I'm currently looking for work and can't understand how people sit at home without good reason, because since my youngest started school, I have been going stir crazy and begun to feel quite down and despondent about not working.

Fortunes will change in the near future as doubtless I will find work, but meanwhile, when you break down the cost of my outgoings, hopefully you can see that lone parents really are not 'rolling in it'.
Especially the ones who receive little or no maintencance from their absent children's father.
Unimagined outgoings include things like termly Brownies subs, school snacks at £8 a month, school shoes every new term, birthday and Christmas presents, rent shortfall £75 a month, winter utilities alone are £40 a week each gas and electric.

Lone parent age 45, two children 5 and 7, private rented three bed (officially two as one leads off the bathroom) terrace Anglia region.'Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit don't enter my bank account, they're paid direct to recipients.

Weekly Income
5.00 CSA
72.40 JobSeekers Allowance
34.05 Child Benefit
114.08 Child Tax Credit

£225.53 week
£902.12 every month

I was just thinking that wouldn't it be really GREAT if just one person looked into their entitlement to in-work benefits, applied and got some help through this thread.

Rabbit I started questioning whether I had made the right career choice (long hours, lots of responsibility, postgraduate exams done in own time and at own cost etc etc) when I realised I was unlikely to have paid off my student loan (2003-9, means-tested plus hardship) by the time my own kids were old enough to start uni!

I wouldn't swap to be on benefits though!

op i get what your saying

was on a thread similar to this (was a differrent name) and posted my benefits as some were saying they were not enough to live on i said it was,even reading others experiences i do realise i get a good amount,but other were saying its a pittance

it was an eye opener to some (i claim for three kids ang have no housing costs,so no top up or morgage payments) and was an eye opener for me what some that work are left with

DH and I both work full time and bring in an OK wage, or so I thought. After all out goings we are on much less than £900 a month.

I agree this isn't a competition over who has what, but it has made me think about how to make my money stretch further.

How frustrating ! What incentive is there for people to work ? I am a single mother with one child and after i have paid my rent and council tax I have 80 per week to pay bills do food shopping the lot! What frustrates me the most is as soon as you work you aren't entitled to any perks like free school meals or bus passes even though my income is less than if i didn't.These perks should be available to workers ! I had a bit of a crisis a few years ago and could i get a crisis grant or budgeting grant of course not as I work.So payday loan it was which really screwed my finances !

I have to ask here, a couple of people upthread that those stating their salaries are not including CTC and WTC etc. Not everyone gets these do they? Or am I missing something? DH and I don't claim a bean and I just assumed that our salaries mean that we wouldn't get anything. Or does everyone get something once you have children?

I haven't read the whole thread but I hope to God it's been mentioning that it's ABSOLUTELY disgusting that the OP is only getting £5 csa off the child(rens) dad. Ffs

It's about time ALL men were brought to task financially for the children they have helped create

The rest of it, well at least we live in a country where there is a safety net and I would try to seek advice about your debts op, as that's what the problem will be

depend on your income if you are entitled to in work benefits

being honest i really dont think i could match wage compared to what i get in benefit

and i dont get any maintanance to add to it either

yes andsmile by all bills I mean the ones we've been talking about, (ct, mortgage,childcare) we do save some on childcare due to DH having childcare vouchers through work I'm not saying we aren't better off, we also have huge debts so it doesn't go far, we live rurally, yes a choice but one made out of family circumstances.
we wouldn't be better off being on benefits, we shop at ocado yes but we don't have a "cheaper" shop within reasonable distance, it is no more expensive than tesco (nearest supermarket 30 mins away). lidl and aldi and other less expensive places are not close, thereby travel costs even out. We have tried it, we just shop more wisely through ocado. they often give vouchers and deals so we use them.
if you hadn't noticed, I'm not begrudging the op, you seem to begrudge the fact that we have that left over after ct and mortgage (interest only so not actually paying that off, similar to thing BUT having to pay for all repairs) and childcare that's what I'm saying after bills etc, we still have to pay the "bills" and so far monthly we are accruing more debt. sorry I should have been clearer :)

The government deficit is only about £95bn a year. If people on this thread who didn't realise they could claim for this, that and the other, decide to claim and tell their friends, we could get the deficit back up to £100bn.

Don't worry about the deficit, we can always print some more money to keep funding the spending that the government cannot afford.

I'd love to get something back :) BUT I would probably also have to pay more for it..............so actually we would probably remain I the status quo. Not much point really :)

Bauer see upthread - you could be entitled to some help, you really need to check as do many others. It's too late (time of day wise) for me to look up the stats but there are huge £s that go unclaimed. This thread has been an eye-opener for me in that I assumed the vast bulk of these unclaimed benefits were the more elderly and it was 'pride' and animosity to means-testing. This thread has proved my assumption wrong. I'm not declaring that this 'in-work benefits economic model' to be the most prudent way of doing things but it's the reality.

no but anyone who claims to earn 1k a month WILL be getting them, or entitled to them bauer.

also again, the OP does not have 900 after all outgoings - she has 900 hit her bank balance, then pays 75 towards rent so 825 before she's bought any food or paid for any utilities. not all outgoings.

i'm not saying that's very little or such just making sure people are comparing like for like.

It is enough to live off but it's just that... not enough for any emergency like a cooker breaking.

The chances are someone on jobseekers will have less options as to where they shop because it will be dependent on buses and being able to afford the fare. So sometimes people on low incomes are forced to shop at the local corner shop which has less choice and is much more expensive. Pre-payment metres cost a small fortune too.

well maybe if they done something about the leaky sieve of tax scams they could lower the deficit

just a thought

The deficit isn't just caused by benefits.
The biggest benefit paid out is in housing benefit, which gets paid to people on low incomes.
If you want to blame something/some one, look at ridiculous house pricing and rental costs compared to people not having a living wage.

Bauer DH and I aren't entitled to any additional benefits, although will get a very small amount of CTC when DS arrives (I think...). We are lucky enough to get £25 a week worth of child care vouchers through work though it'll certainly be fun when I return to work full time after ML and childcare then comes out of our £700 a month 'extra' dosh...

You have more money per month than i do working. i still have bills to come off that every month, plus a work pension as well. My working tax credit has been cut to the bone and isn't really worth the having. Plus have a DD at uni, who does support herself by and large, but that makes me feel guilty, so do send her money and do shopping for her. Its a crap life sometimes.

or companies trading here and taking out of our economy without paying anything back at all in tax and taking all the money they make offshore.

or bloody mps whose expenses claims probably come to more in a week than the op gets in a month.

Yes, but let's blame the little people, especially if they are women

thehoneybadger I was just about to say same thing about MP's.

It's funny how quickly all the MP expense fiddlers are soon forgotten and don't get the same rap

Late to the party here, but I don't understand all of the posters who are saying they work full time and have less than the OP. Is that before you claim CB? CTC?

Minimum wage full time is £10,040 a year (obviously you would get top ups, free school meals, CTC, CB, housing/council tax benefits?)

Hate benefit bashing threads - but, having only ever struggled by on JSA, single person's allowance, had no idea it could be as much as OP has so candidly disclosed.

BTW - quite right for the benefits person to look askance and for sanctions to be applied when you failed to evidence your job search efforts one week. These have to be demonstrated in order to maintain benefits. Them the rules...