To think that nobody goes to the job centre to get a job?

[Whyhaveidonethis]

Do they? Surely they should change the name back to the benefits service. The last place anyone who actually wanted a decent job would go to find one is the bloody job centre? I mean they can call it what they want, but I don't know a single person who has ended up finding a job in the jobcentre, feels a bit like false advertising, only people I've met that go there go for benefits!!

Or AIBU and everyone who goes there gets a job?

Granted it was now about twenty years ago but I went to the Job Centre to look for a job and ended up with a job in the Job Centre! It was a temp job for a few months and got something permanent through an agency in the meantime.

I don't think they do that anymore disquieted, which is a shame as I can imagine it helped a lot of people. I know they can offer reduced cost bus passes in some areas and they can give you public transport costs back for attending the job centre itself but it's reimbursement of your ticket within 3-5 working days - fine if you have the money spare, not so much if you don't. You get nothing if you drive yourself or get a lift, even if you have to pay to park. They do (or did) have a discretionary fund but I don't think it's used very often.

I went to the job centre back in 2011 in central London, I'd quit my job as i was supposed to be moving to America with an EX but didn't end up going. I had my CV on a USB stick to be told that there system didn't take a USB and i needed to print a copy. I was told i needed to sign on and given an appointment time, arrived and there was a room of about 20 of us, no privacy or anything all applying.
I was given an interview and it was at the job centre, i had to turn up and it was for cleaning work. I'm not bothered and had worked out i could survive off that until I'd found something I liked. The interviewer was pissed off but really nice with me, she said she didn't know why they'd bothered to put me on the list because as soon as I'd find something I'd be off and i agreed with her, she told me this happens all the time and is just a 'box ticking' exercise that they do

I went to one when I was trying to get back to work after being at home with kids and it was a joke. Navigating my way past 2 burly security guards at the door was charming. I was asking for advice about getting back to work but was told as I wasn’t on benefits they couldn’t help me. The job search aspect is basically a shit website where most of the jobs were ‘sales’ with only on target earnings (so no fixed rate/wage) I applied for benefits so they started checking me every two weeks for a meeting to review what jobs I’d applied for. The guy was nice who dealt with me but it was a thankless task and I got turned down for benefits so stopped going. Visited a Government funded ‘skills development’ company too but they were totally useless and only seemed set up for school leavers with no qualifications or people who wanted to go to college to get their qualifications up to speed. I ended up getting a job myself for a couple of years but am back unemployed and 5 years older and finding it hard to get anything. But I won’t be visiting the ‘job’ centre ever again!

In 2007 I went to the job centre to try and get back to work after 2 years off due to serious spinal injuries and surgery.
I was recovered and DLA was due to expire.
Ended up in tears as the woman was so dismissive. "Oh you dont need to get a job,dear, just reapply for DLA. I can see you re disabled". I bloody wasnt. I had just finished months of physio and was walking fine (obviously slowly).
I was 39 with teenage dc. I didnt want a life on benefits.
I got myself a job through the local paper that week.

I agree. The job centre never helped me to actually get a job. I have been unemployed twice in my life for a number of months each time and the only thing I got at the job centre were unpleasant interactions with sneery, rude women (I have no idea why the women were so nasty and the men were perfectly professional) but every time I left after signing on with a woman I came out feeling like I was scum and without any realistic options for work.

I was once threatened with sanctions when I declined to apply for a job that was random hours (so wouldn't fit with a second job) and would leave me with about a fiver after rent, council tax and water was paid. Nothing for the other utilities, transport, food etc and I would be ineligible for benefit top ups (age 18, no kids, lived alone).

The second time, in my 20's, I was made to feel like a lazy scrounger and threatened with sanctions (which her manager overruled) because I had turned down a job that asked for a full body photo and the uniform was baseball cap, sports bra and hotpants and lucky little me would get to stand in a city centre until the early hours promoting a club. The job centre manager pulled the ad when I told him what the interviewer had told me and I was allowed to sign on again with no sanction.

I found my own jobs eventually.

Bugged the hell out of me that people in paint splattered boiler suits and rugged boots, clearly working as labourers somewhere could wander in, start a sentence with "Well the fing' is...." and give silly excuses as to why they had no proof of looking for work, be told "sign here please" and to be told "See you next week". That's it.

I'm 65 and unemployed (downsized out of my job). My SPA is late 2020. I have to attend the jobcentre as well as fill in my online journal under UC. my 'work coach' tried to push me to attend a course run by a cleaning company ( course is government funded). At the end of the course I would receive an 'employability certificate' and a guaranteed interview with said cleaning firm. This firm wants cleaners who drive, so an interview would be pointless for me as I don't drive.

An 'employability certificate' may be of use to someone looking for their first job, but for someone my age, with a work history from 1971?

Funnily enough Ive just perused the Job Centre online but no way would I actually go in there.

The last time was about 8 years ago, there was a bouncer on the door and a very aggressive

Completely agree I went in albeit a few years ago and the man told me to go home and look online practically laughed at me to have the audacity to come in looking for a job!!

I recall going not long after my mat leave had ended, I'd returned to my work part time but wasn't happy. I went to the JC and they told me I had to be available to work 40 hours a week. I said that wasn't a problem and I was quite happy to but I needed a job that fitted around my dd and dh so 9-5 wouldn't work. They looked at me like I'd lost the plot, laughed and said they'd never had anyone request that before! I was happy to work, but it had to fit around my family, crazy, eh?!

Twenty odd years ago as a young naive girl just out of college I went to the local Jobcentre. I was seen by the rudest nastiest woman ever who shouted at me for being 'late' despite me having been sat there for twenty minutes watching her chat with friends. Luckily that was the only time I ever had to go as a week later I found my own job working for not the actual Jobcentre but the benefit processing side.
I have never ever forgotten that woman and how I was spoken to then and would never dream of speaking to anyone how she did me. I've worked for the DWP 22years now and always try to speak to and treat people how I would like members of my family to be spoken to and treated.

Many years ago I got 2 jobs from going to the job centre
So yes, the system worked for me

I think it maybe depends on the type of job you're looking for. DP was made redundant a few years ago and no, he wasn't going to find a job in his (relatively specialised) field by going to the Job Centre. But to be fair they didn't ask him to; in order to claim jobseeker's allowance he just had to keep showing them evidence of applications he'd been making elsewhere. IIRC they gave him about a year to find something in his field and said if he hadn't found anything in that time he'd have to start applying for any old random stuff.

If he'd been looking for retail, factory, farm, warehouse, call centre, admin or sales type jobs it might have been different though. Those were the types of things mostly being advertised there at the time I think, although that was about five or six years ago now.

Here are some experiences of mine which i posted on another thread.

In the late 1990s both DH and i were signing on but had separate signing on times on different days.

One day while signing on i was made to sign a form saying i would consider part time work,

a. DH wasnt asked this at all I asked him whether he had been each time he signed on after that.
b. This happened in the late 90s but the Sex Discrimination Act came in in 1975!

14 years ago in 2005 i was signing on again and secured an interview with a building society a 45 minute bus ride away. Interview was at 1pm and there were buses running every half an hour. So i made sure i got to bus stop at 11am. Plenty of time. 11 am no bus 11.30am no bus 12pm no bus. I panicked and walked straight across the road to the Job Centre
WHERE THEY HAD BEEN WATCHING ME FOR THE LAST HOUR THROUGH THEIR OPEN DOOR AS THE BUS STOP WAS A FEW FEET OPPOSITE THE JC!

i asked them what i should do and they had the temerity to accuse me of missing the bus even though the bastards had been watching me wait for a bus that didnt show for the last hour. Absolute cunts!

This happened in 2005. It was bad enough them gaslighting me the way they did but if i was signing on today and this occured i have no doubt that i would be sanctioned too.

I’ve never been inside one but they don’t like particularly insuring from the outside. I would probably opt to walk from business to business asking if they are recruiting if in need.

And they KEPT repeating that i had missed the bus while talking to each other in front of me.

I could not get a taxi because i just didnt have enough money. And unlike @Disquieted1 they said no when i asked if theyd help pay for it.

I've dealt with job centre in the past but I have always found jobs on my own. I always felt I wasted my time there, and they weren't any help at all.

I only went there because I had to sign on to the JSA and for that, you have to rock up there every two weeks.

I found a job but the job centre was of no help. There is no support whatsoever to find work. I am educated and computer literate with a PC at home and lots of work experience. I am perfectly capable of applying myself. I only showed up there as I needed the JSA to tie me over. I really felt sorry for many people in there as they many of them got a really shitty treatment from stadf, being criticised for the way they applied if that they didn't apply enough or issues with the CV. some people would have needed genuine help in applying. But all the JSA people did was checking how many applications one write on a day/how much time was spent on applying (you have to do it via a portal and log everything so easy for them to see).

I got the impression they only looked for reasons to sanction people rather than genuinely helping job seekers to find employment.

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/jobcentre-easter-egg-hunt-an-insult-386606

I agree the jobcentre is a misnomer these days and there is little the staff can do to help you find a job. You may be referred to an agency that deals with your line of work but thats as far as it goes.

Reading through these posts you would think that individual staff in the job centres have set up each one, decided on the name and invented their own rules. They are grossly understaffed - but guess what ? They dont decide on recruiting any more than you as a citizen do. Some PPs write as if the staff have deliberately made themselves overworked and are being contrary in not employing folk who wander in off the street.

If anyone treats you less than well you have every right to complain about that person . You can even do it online .
But please dont blame the staff for the changes wrought by several governments.They are as frustrated as you are.

I deal with JCP each day for my clients and they are immensely helpful . They do point them in the right direction workwise and try to help if they are not able to go online at home. They arrange for callbacks if clients are having problems with their benefits and issue payment to help them travel to interviews - and to work within the first pay period if thats required.

But they should change the bloody name as some of my working clients are really upset at having to go even if its just to take documents for scanning.

I've never been to one, but signed up for an EU funded "get into work scheme". I believe they work in similar ways. I was made redundant and have very niche skills so struggled to find an appropriate job for me. To tell the truth there aren't many available anyways (about 2-3 a month but all of them would be suitable by transferring skills and not by direct experience).

Anywho, this man wasn't too rude but it was disheartening that from the very start I said I wanted to get a 9-5 office job and that that was my only request. No shift patterns as those don't really work with someone with shared custody.

Well he was adamant I needed to try some restaurant hostess role. I kindly said no. Then one of being a "support worker" which I also declined. He got me on the verge of tears more than once.

I eventually got a job in my field by myself. They had the pizzazz to call my employer to tell them it was thanks to them! I was fuming but thankfully nobody thought much about it at work :)

I work at the jobcentre and spend the majority of my time supporting people access local services rather than finding work.

How do people who work at the Job Centre get their job?

They get the jobs by applying through the Civil Service Jobs website. Anyone can register on it and search the data-base.

I once advertised an entry-level casual job at the jc. Every candidate we interviewed from there clearly didn't want the job at all and spent the interview trying to put me off hiring them! I presume they would have been worse off if they had got it so I can't blame them.