To the think this Universal Credit rule is so so wrong!

[ilovewelshrarebit123]

I'm a single parent, one DD and I work 30 hours a week.

I didn't get my UC payment this month which was a complete shock. I get paid my salary on the 15th of every month, and as the 15th of August was over the weekend I got paid on the 14th.

After investigation which has taken over a week, UC say I've been paid twice in the assessment period (15th to 14th) so I get nothing. I was paid on the 15/8 and 14/9 but it isn't two payments in one month is it. It was just a day early because of the weekend.

I'm £600 down and i just can't get my head around this policy. They've said there is nothing that can be done and I won't be getting this payment. It will also happen in January due to Decembers pay date.

They suggested I cancel my UC claim, start another one so the assessment period is different. But then I have to start the claim again and wait the 6 week assessment period with no payments.

Please don't tell me not to 'rely' on UC, I have no choice and I work hard.

So that's it, I'm stuffed this month through no fault of my own and UC is a crock of shit! 😡

We are still on tax credits when is it meant to be changed to UC ?

Either later this year or entirely next year, Is, full roll out is scheduled for all next year.

That's a joke! Ffs you get paid early due to banking days and you need to survive without your UC? This is policy derived by people who have clearly never lived paycheck to paycheck. Sorry OP hope you get through the month ok.

Fucking disgusting and utterly ridiculous, I had no idea. How is anyone still voting Tory?

Disabled people can lose a fair chunk more than £30 a week, if you are aged under 35 - because you won't be eligible for the same rate of housing benefit as before.

We can argue all we like but it will never ever change . Honestly they do not care and I’m sure a Labour government won’t overturn the legislation in place now. All we can do is warn people this will happen.

Next month however you will get more universal credit as it will look like you haven't earnt any wages in the assessment period

People have to stop thinking of it like tax credits where you got a monthly payment which was always the same. Uc is very different - any earnings in your assessment period will reduce your Uc amount. if you get paid four weekly or weekly there will be some months where you get less or none at all. It is up to you to plan and budget accordingly. if you are paid monthly and you get paid early then the next month you will get more as no payday will fall in the assessment period. unfortunately they are not going to explain in depth how it works but there is plenty of information out there for people to educate themselves about what benefit they are claiming and exactly how it works. I agree it's not great and there are a lot of problems but with careful examination of pay days and assessment periods people can plan for it.

There are some things that are better on UC - if you have a non dependent young person living with you there is no deduction to your rent element until that young person turns 21. On housing benefit you would lose Hb when your non dependent left education and started earning.

i am sure a Labour government won’t overturn the legislation in place now.

They may not get rid of UC but call me naive but I do think they would change vicious policies like this one.

I think this policy is deliberate and all adding to the message don’t expect the state to provide adequate help encouraging people to get private insurance to cover losing a job or work ridiculous long hours for those on lower wages. The conservatives since 2010 (I know Lib Dem were In coalition from 2010 to 2015) have introduced huge cuts, they have been savage in the changes to disabity benefits, plus social care costs, and now they are happy to shaft those on low wages. The sanction scheme is particularly punitive. lord Freud thought it all up.

There are many hideous and awful aspects to UC, and this is up there with reducing the premiums for disabled people, and counting student LOANS as an income (it is not for tax credits) as it's bloody repayable!! Oh and having to pay childcare up front, for it to be repaid next month - meaning most people needing childcare won't be able to go to work as they have to wait so long for the payment.

As a single parent, of 3 children, one of whom has a disability, I am incredibly vulnerable to UC and it's punitive policies. I am a professional, in a professional job, and am one UC fuck up away from losing my career (very high childcare costs - which if I can't pay, I can't work). If I lose that, I will lose everything else I ever worked for.

Working pays does it? Really?!

I agree the sanction scheme is punitive and awful and the job searching is ridiculous too. My 53 year old friend was recently asked by her work coach to write a 500 word essay on a day in the life of a receptionist ! It's so demeaning and utterly unacceptable.

The childcare issue is a shambles - how on earth can people afford to pay hundreds of pound up front like that? And there have been numerous problems with people being able to upload invoices to get it refunded.

They have been careful to mean a few people may benefit, so some will say it’s ok, but the amount they are spending on welfare has come down overall. They say it had to be done in the name of austerity. Yet austerity hasn’t worked the national debt is higher now than when the Coalition came into power in 2010. May said at the conference this week austerity is ending and it has worked, country’s debts have been paid off, which is a barefaced lie when the national debt has risen.

Holy shit I never realised it worked like that. Fortunately we are still on the old tax credits system, but dh gets paid 4 weekly so this will massively screw us over.

Its so so wrong.

I think though in order to plan for this, you need to have a cushion in the first place to cover you the first time it happens.

Lots of people don't have that cushion so would likely be in the position of having to borrow more on cc or overdraft to cover that month. Which leaves less for next month once you've taken into account interest and charges. Which leaves you borrowing more to cover you ..... and so on.

@babyroobs, reading the link singalong gave on page 1 by Child Poverty Action Group, I am understanding it that those working who get paid four weekly will not be fully compensated for the month they get no work allowance component?

“Further, as the claimant is entitled to a working allowance, she effectively loses out on the benefit of one working allowance against one month’s salary which is not compensated by the fact that the following assessment period she is treated as receiving no wages and so gets the maximum UC allowance”

www.cpag.org.uk/content/universal-credit-assessment-period-inflexibility

People on UC start off in debt if they borrow the advance to get them through the first month as this is then clawed back each month so you have deductions made before you get your payment. Also closing down a tax credit claim to go onto UC also seems to trigger tax credits overpayments which they then start to claw back also, so a big chunk of your monthly payment can be gone before you get your payment.

Babyroobs, yes, in theory that makes sense, but actually doing it is pedantic (to the extent of making no real-life common sense) and (deliberately, I believe) punitive. Presumably if someone is on UC in the first place their scope to 'plan and budget accordingly' may be very limited? And then the state feels justified in turning round and saying 'but you didn't Plan and Budget Accordingly, you feckless poor person'. Strikes me as rather cruel, and not a bit Kafkaesque. Quiteapart from the fact that planning and budgeting is easier with w regular income.

Sorry for typos.

Tog - yes that's correct they will lose out on the work allowance which can be £198 or £409 depending on your housing situation.

I am a member of a Facebook page for benefits including UC.

Today alone, I read a journal message (this is how the jobcentre contact you and deal with your UC claim) saying that they were taking child maintenance as income and had cacluated a monthly amount to deduct from UC. This is NOT correct. This is NOT how UC or 99.9% of benefits work. It's staggering that someone employed in this position did not know this, and penalised this single mother.

Not only that, but the majority of journal messages I have seen (and I have seen thousands now) are written poorly - poor spelling, grammar, autocorrect, and generally making not much sense.

Elderly - very true . I'm trying to explain to my clients currently going onto UC how this will affect them so that they can plan to some extent but yes I agree very difficult especially if the month when you get nothing falls close to the start of your claim and you have no time to prepare and you've already just gone 5 weeks without money. It's a shambles.

I work for a housing association, UC is our biggest headache currently!

For those of you who are going to be relying on it for rent, a heads up would be to start paying a little extra (if possible), to get your account in advance, because when that 6 weeks with no payment hits, it can cause some serious damage.

It's a massive change and a lot to get your head round

The job coaches seem to know very little and the training seems to be very poor and they are totally overwhelmed dealing with journal messages and thousands of calls to the helplines. I work for a charity organisation, we had representatives from the DWP promising that all these issues wouldn't happen to our group of ( very vulnerable ) clients but they are . Ill and disabled people are transferring from ESA to Uc and having to wait weeks to get their ESA status transferred across and the call handlers don't understand the legislation and it just creates so much stress for vulnerable people.

My journal entry was so abrupt and dismissive. He literally wrote two lines saying I'd been paid twice in that month.

No suggestions of what to do, where to go for help nothing, just cold facts.