Job center plus bollocked me for printing out housing benefit form

[jsaclaim2016]

Apparently the printouts at jcp are only allowed for job searches. I assumed as it was for claiming housing benefit it would be fine. But no they told me off and treated me like a delinquent. There is no libaray open on Tuesdays around here and I don't have a printer.

Was I unreasonable?

Ah chaos - my experience is out of date. Sorry. I never think it hurts to complain though. Before you become unemployed, you used to be a real person that mattered. It's good to hold on to that. They're always going on about keeping your employment skills alive.

limited - your posts on this thread.......

Dont worry about t

I think the job centre should have a stash of forms already printed out. It's hardly surprising that someone who has lost their job might need housing benefit. Forgive my ignorance, can housing benefit be claimed online without the need to print out a form?

Er, people who work at the job centre are not all thick, cunts or any of the other epithets on here, they're just a random set of workers of varying abilities/compassion.

Bloody hell, since when was it OK to lump several thousand people into the 'they're all shit' pile?

People who work at jobcentres are just people. Some of them are MNers. They have kids and homes and probably not a lot of other options. Do you really think they have that much power??

Calling a whole group of people cunts is not only stupid and ill-informed but certainly not in the spirit of the site.

I am sorry for the OP - that is horrible but we should be supporting each other in the face of difficulty not just slagging off other people trapped in the system

They're probably on commission to "Tell as many people off as possible" or maybe they get a lollypop and gold star.

This sort of crap is exactly why I stopped working at the Jobcentre. It got to the point where we had to tell people they couldn't use the phones unless it was to ring about a job (even to ring our sodding processing department who had messed up their claim leaving them with no money for weeks) - the management didn't even consider the fact that many people had also had their phones cut off due to them not being paid for weeks either.

Then there was enforcing the frankly ridiculous "you must prove that you are applying for 10 million jobs every week" rules, and sanctioning people who were clearly doing everything they could to find work (because they'd already applied for all the available jobs and couldn't meet the targets without dupicating)

And then forcing people to go on basic skills courses etc no matter their level of education.

And they wondered why violent incidents towards staff were increasing.

I had too much of a conscience to work there. People who were human beings like me were coming in for help, and petty rules meant I was unable to help.

Of course comments like People who work at the Jobcentre are thick as pigshit. , which were rife then too, didn't help matters much.

Please excuse any typos/mistakes in my above post, I'm not really thick as pigshit, just tired and full of a cold!

Well we've that from the horse's mouth, Eleanor.

Eleanor that sounds miserable.

we had to tell people they couldn't use the phones unless it was to ring about a job (even to ring our sodding processing department who had messed up their claim leaving them with no money for weeks) - the management didn't even consider the fact that many people had also had their phones cut off due to them not being paid for weeks either

So what do people do? Their money has stopped. They were living hand to mouth. Their phones are cut off/out of credit and they can't use JC phones. How is it sorted out?

EleanorAbernathy I think this is part of the problem - the nice people like you cant take the crap and they leave...

The GP's receptionist once refused to post me a 1 page document I requested, saying it was a waste of their budget. In an annoyed tone I replied that I would pay them the 30whatever pence postage. After a 10 minute discussion with co workers on the difficulties of accepting and documenting the payment they decided it was a better use of resources to send it to me anyway, at their cost!!

^ the Jobcentre is the only place I would like to work in less than the NHS. the bureaucracy and obsession with targets seems dangerous and counter productive, not to mention hellish.

My DH is currently unemployed and we've been pleasantly surprised by how nice, helpful and approachable the local job centre staff have been. He had to cancel his first appointment with them as I was busy giving birth and every time he called them they'd ask after our son. At his first signing on appointment he ended up chatting to an adviser who had the same music taste as him - as far as I can tell they barely talked about his efforts to find work (which is awful but hey). The staff have all gone out of their way to help out and direct us to the various benefits we might be entitled to.

As a pp said though, housing benefit falls under the LA's remit. Even our super friendly JC+ wouldn't let my DH use their Internet connection to apply, so I'm not surprised they'd balk at you printing the form. To tell you off is an overreaction but to play devil's advocate they probably have to deal with lots of people actually abusing the internet/printing privileges in the centre.

It's relatively easy to apply online if you can access the Internet at home / in a library or Internet café OP? You just need to send in your supporting documents or take them into the council offices in person.

Our library charges 15p per sheet for printing - in the OP shoes I would have printed the form anyway then taken the bollocking, cheering myself up with the secret knowledge of how much money I'd saved...

Ahem
Peace and love
A reminder that Mumsnet's raison d'être is to make lives easier

You should have suggested they give you a job policing the printers!

Glad to be of service Gobbolinothewitchscat

I found most JobCentrePlus workers to be fine and some to be very kind. But you cannot deny that there are cunts. For them, I made it my mission to be the bigger cunt.