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

Thats alot left. Professional couple who lived on £20 per week food last year. Hence why we leaving london and the silly rent who drained us..

I don't begrudge the OP any of her money tbh.

The whole of this thread seems to me to be a gross race to the bottom "I haven't got x so neither should you".

Honestly this thread is one big gross complaint that the OP has enough money to live on. No she doesn't work so what is the solution? The poor house? Giving her the equivalent of a weeks min wage? A weeks part time min wage? Working out how much she needs to prevent starvation but just enough she isn't full? Honestly what do you all want?

You know those lot above ALL of us are laughing and laughing and laughing. Look at us all fighting over the crappy scraps of benefits and low wages, infighting over money that wouldn't cover a normal lunch for that lot. How blind we all are.

pooh sorry if I seemed direct - Im on a debt helpee thread. Used to being 'told' how to increase/decrease.

I think it depends what you buy from Ocado - I buy tesco value vegetables and find these cheaper and meat. Im not a Aldi or Lidle convert tbh. But I spend £50 per week on food at the minute and it takes planning (a lot of faffing online basket) and effort to cook meals when previously I may have used more convenient products. But its working out healthier.

Have a look at the debt thread it has tons of advice and links. they maybe some ways to stop incurring any more.

OP has £827 after CT and Rent (£75 top up)

less £160 (gas and electric)

£667 for food, clothes and leisure. It not loads but I think plenty.

It doesnt seem fair to other who are working hard and end up with less. I dont know what the answer is.

That is more than I have, I work 43 hours a week plus have a 3 hour commute every day. I have 3 kids.

One of the problems I think is that you can't just be really truly poor nowadays. Just a few decades ago it used to be allowed that you could live in a slum and your kids wouldn't have any shoes and would always be filthy because there was nowhere proper to wash or to have any other clothes to change into. It was ok back then - at least The Poor were the poor and knew it and so did everyone else. You're just not allowed to be that poor nowadays.

and smile, don't worry :) might pop over to get some good tips :)
I've been doing a budget plan for e next 12 months and yes we are ho getting more in debt by a small amount each month, but we are cutting back on stuff and ebaying the crap out of the house (we have a great deal of crap!) from better times.

funnily enough I'm not overly bothered by it, life is too short and ocado is the luxury I have that before used to be on stuff just for me! we don't really go out so we eat healthily at home, we just don't buy the naice stuff we used to.
And we do "own" our own home (well the bit the bank doesn't!) so we feel very blessed.

I would love not to work for example, but think I've missed the boat as I worked throughout the period of my dcs life I would have liked to be at home, work is a pita BUT I have the luxury of not feeling like I'm on a downward spiral. That has to be the the worst of it, being in a trap that it's better NOT to work for your finances but not for your mental health. I look forward to a payrise in a better economy, a small amount of well known benefit "scammers" do an injustice to those that survive. Hopefully in a one day better economy situation people like the OP will have a better quality of life and a job that they really want. The scammers will always be there, in everything, not sure how we fix that without penalising others.

Good grief.

This is unique to benefits threads. I could do three laps of the site right now, commenting on other peoples jobs, houses, educations, cars, husbands, the sheer dumb luck people are born or fall into, parroting 'that's more than I have' , 'that's better than the one I've got'.

But life doesn't work like that, does it? Besides, I'm bloody lucky and I know I am.

Everyone queuing up here pretending they envy an unemployed DV escapee, with a deadbeat ex, who rents a flawed and not overly cheap house are fucking liars. What IS this?

I'm sorry but 900 after housing costs is a huge amount. This is too much when not working. There are too many people working 50 hours a week with nowhere near that disposable income and without the benefit of being spending so much time with their kids. Wrong, so wrong.

No Arsenic - the OP has presented herself as a general example for our info. People aren't jealous of her individual circs. They are just responding to how much she (i.e. a person with her basic profile, not anything to do with her specifically) gets from the state.

£900 a month for not working is bloody disgusting. I don't care what anyone says.

I totally agree that the focus of this thread should not be about removing benefits but about questioning why people in work are less well off. I know many who work full time and have far less money and far more commitments (childcare being at least one of them)

There have been quite a few 'I don't know why I bother working' responses party. People must surely know why they work?

Equally, 'that's more than I have after mortgage/rent and council tax' is a bit of an odd response, really, given all the variables, and that the OP's income is only temporary.

I cannot believe the op started this thread to prove that people on benefits had it hard due to the lady getting 3k per month. How is this hard up?
Really changed my thinking on who I will vote for. Hope you don't get a goat, they are expensive to feed and I wouldn't want you to get anymore.
Your ex sounds like a waster if he only gives you a fiver by the way, he should pay more.

Creepus, honestly how much would you deem not disgusting?

I chose to be a SAHP I dont claim anything at all.

I know from staying at home after working for many years is unhealthy for my mental health overall. I've had to be proactive in doinf certain things to stop myself from sliding - as this in turn affects physical health too.
Its not what is all cracked up to be unless you are uber rich and have uber rich friends to mingle with during school hours. But I am grateful for the lack of work stress even if i still have minor pressure points.

I dont think it is anyones picnic to stay at home. Even if for small number of claimants it is a lifestyle choice they are can't possibly have any pride in purposefully avoiding work. On some level they must live with their choice. I stress the small numbers of people not claimants in general.

Looking at OPs figures, if I was staying myself I would get £75. Because there are 2 children I am given an extra £150. How is that fair? I've often thought that childless people get a rough deal with regards to benefits. This proves it.

I don't understand. Are you saying ppl without kids should get the same as ppl with kids? Surely the point is to ensure children don't live in poverty, by making sure the family income is enough? No kids, means less food, fewer bedrooms,etc. surely no kids is cheaper?

Oh, I don't know Igotafreegoattoo - probably about half that much. That's still more than a lot of working people have spare, after they've paid their mortgage/rent, council tax, school dinners, school trips, medical costs, etc.

FloatIsRechargedNow I have a very, very kind mother who looks after DS for me otherwise I would have had to sell my house as no way could I have afforded childcare. However, if I had done that I wouldn't have been able to afford to rent on my wages (2 bed property in this area around £900-£1100) which would have led to me having to drop my hours just to get housing benefit ( I earn just above the line to get any help). It is one fucked up system and also a crazy time where rents are so high.

I'm not against benefits and I am glad that there is a safety net for people. I hope to never need help myself, but I am glad that I have that option if desperate.

But £26,000 a year for doing nothing?!
I earn £18,500 a year in a very stressful, physically draining job. Doesn't seem right somehow....

I don't blame the people though, I blame the system.

The system is at fault. I don't understand why some people need food banks and others seem to be doing quite nicely. That's why people aren't sympathetic when it comes to benefits. It isn't a fair system. I thought they were moving away from the situation where people are worse off in work than they are not working. And that's not even taking transport and other costs into consideration.

So £450 a month? Roughly £120 a week?

That's for food for 3 people, utilities, clothing, transport. You realise that is impossible?

What medical bills are average UK citizens paying? People on benefits still pay full whack for school trips. I'll give you school dinners and prescriptions though.

This is ironic, to all those saying this is more than working parents have left over.
This is the amount deemed necessary for a person in the OP's position. If you are getting less for working it isn't paying you to work.
That is not the fault of the OP or other benefit claimants.

People on benefits don't pay for trips at my son's school. They get them for free if they get free school dinners. I'm talking about dental costs, costs for glasses and prescriptions - obviously these don't apply to everyone, but if you need these and you're not on benefits, but on the breadline, you're fucked. OK, Igotafreegoattoo ? (Speaking from bitter experience here, btw!)

well i have always paid full for my 3 children to go on school trips,i am on benefit and would not expect a reduction,everybody should pay the same for trips imho

morethan maybe not, but the real irony is that the OP started this thread to point out how little those living on benefits receive.

Igotafree it varies from school to school but those in receipt of benefits often don't pay "full whack" for trips. Schools receive funds to help those on benefits access the full curriculum - that is why they are very keen that everyone who is entitled to free school meals signs up for them.