To think I can go on benefits instead of returning to work?

[UniversalCreditOrNo]

NC for this.

Let me start off by saying this....up until
February last year, I have never not been in work. I got my first job at 13, was working full time and living alone at age 21 (before which I worked 25 hours a week alongside my studies) and it was only last year when I decided to go travelling that I ever found myself without employment. I got pregnant at the end of my travels, and here is where I find myself.

My daughter is now 6 months old. In 3 months time, I’m supposed to go back to work. How do people afford to do it? Childcare is £56 a day where I am. On my current minimum wage job that’s a take home of around £30 a week....before tax and NI.

My partner is on around £20k and I can rely on family for 1 day a week childcare. So here’s my AIBU. Can I go on benefits, instead of going back to work? Is that a thing people can do?!

I don’t know how it works. My area is universal credit....is there even such a category for this? It’s not jobseekers as I wouldn’t be looking for work, and it’s not like I’m signed off with illness or disability.

My partner is convinced we can because he doesn’t earn a lot and ‘this is precisely what the benefits system is for’. However....his mum is a serial benefits user....everything from being a stay at home single mum until her youngest was 15, until now where she’s signed off for an injury from 3 years ago she still claims is affecting her work ability All I can think of is the stigma behind choosing to go on benefits, but right now I can’t see another option.

By the way, niece has access to free childcare support so it definitely is a choice for her.

I'm not going to comment on the benefits point, but ha e a few observations:

1. If the OP was studying up to the age of 21, she is presumably a graduate and, combined with her work history, ought to be able to find a job that pays above minimum wage;

2. she will have one free day of childcare from family, and presumably her partner works 5 days a week, leaving two during which he could look after the baby, leaving three days a week that she could work without incurring childcare costs or having to leave her child with strangers;

3. a number of PPs have suggested becoming a child-minder and I agree with this suggestion. The childminders I have used in the past did this to allow them to stay at home with their own children. If the going rate in the OP's area is £56 a day, she could earn £280 a week (for 5 days) and not incur any childcare costs of her own. That would be just from having one child to mind, and obviously if she had two, she'd earn double, still with no childcare costs of her own.

I think you would not be eligible for UC in this situation TBH. Try to check on benefit calculator".Turn to us ". Can you fit work around DH at all? I used to work evenings ,W/E when DD was small . I understand about not wanting to put DC in Nursery ,and it doesnt sound financially viable for you anyway .Can you live on one salary for a while? For £30 extra P/W its only £120 a month .Could you shop more cheaply (Aldi/Lidl)cook from scratch ,Jack Monroe cheap recipes and so on .What about working from home (Ironing whatever).Its only for a few years and maybe you could get a P/T job when she starts Nursery?(At 3)or so

@Henrysmycat , yes indeed.

Oh FFS 'work' is NOT the only way to a better life for people with low incomes. The reallity is shitty jobs for shitty pay and still having to miss meals no matter how hard you try. There is little or no progression in many service industry jobs: staff are regarded as interchangeable, disposable subhumans.

Are there things you could do from home, OP? Do you have any specific skills you could monetise?

But there is still a child tax credit and working tax credit ‘element’ of UC that low income families can claim without having to attend meetings and look for work. At least there was when it 1st came to our area about 4 years ago (one of the 1st places they rolled it out so it might have changed). I think on a salary of 20k you would get about £100 per month, maybe a little more (which isn’t far off what you’d take home from work?) and possibly the 15 hours childcare from age 2? So worth looking into.

A couple of things.
If you don't go back to work after mat leave for a certain time period and decide to quit, you may have to pay back some of your maternity pay (depending on contract).
If you decide to quit.. I'm not sure what that entitles you too because you've willingly made yourself unemployed.
I would recommend (as i will be doing when I go back to work), finding an evening and weekend job,or going back to work part time (16.5 hours is the threshold for some benefits so may be worth checking).
You will also find nurseries will charge either morning, afternoon or all day.. even if you dont use the whole session. Have you thought about an hourly paid childminder instead? Round here they are £4-£5 an hour and will work much better for me.

I know it is not a major point but OP how on earth could you get your first job at 13 I assume you are fairly young still (i.e. not over 50)
if you meant you got your first part-time job after school that would be more accurate.

@17million could be paper round, sweeping hair in a salon, family business on a weekend - it was much easier even 15 years ago to earn money at 13 than it is now

We were in a similar situation to you OP. I had DS and DH was earning just over £20,000. I've always been of the opinion that if I can look after my children myself then I would - I know there are circumstances where women have to go back to work or choose to even if they don't have to, but for me, I wanted to be there every step of them growing up. And that is entirely everyone else's choice.
So I chose not to go back to work. And on his wage we weren't entitled to any benefits, only the usual child benefits that everyone gets.
So I took a job working weekend evenings in a bar. I'd do one weekday evening and Saturday and Sunday evening. Then I'd clean the same bar every morning (It was only an hour in the morning, and evenings when I'd work the bar I'd stay on after closing at clean at night to give me the day off the next day) I would sit him in his buggy, as he got older I'd put CBeebies on the big telly. Same thing when DS2 came along. It worked around DH being the main earner and me looking after the children.
We did ok for money and it got me out of the house.
I loved working a bar.

I don't think it benefits anyone for small children to be in full-time childcare, especially for £30 a week, basically you're working to pay someone else to look after your child (which I think a parent is much better doing).
I don't think you've phrased your post well - just stay at home and look after him, you may get a little bit from the government to enable you to do this. You can go back to work when your 30 hours free childcare kick in when your child is 2 or 3.

I didn’t go back to full time work / pay child care for my children. Instead I set up self employed and worked from home / in the evenings. It is doable.

Have a look at entitledto website that will give you an idea if you are entitled to any help based on your income and situation including if you go back to work and pay child care (it will take that into account too).

A lot of families have had to face up to going to work and having children in daycare even though we would rather have stayed with our cherubs. It's called growing up, while our children were growing up we were barely breaking even with childcare costs. It really isn't an option to live off the taxpayer because you will only be £30 better off, that's a choice you made OP. Sorry to sound harsh but that is just how it is.

'Good God! I hope you lot get as excited about white collar tax evasion and the inequitable society we live in with food banks for the working poor!'

This. Also this: 'The only way out of a life on a low income is working to improve your prospects.'

OP, you would be better finding a way to make working work (the UK as a society would also be better off if it invested in proper, decent, state subsidised childcare, as in much of Europe, rather than making childcare on low wages the parent's problem and punishing them for struggling to manage, but that's by the by). Along with the important issues around your unmarried status and the issues of independence, self respect, future career advancement etc (perhaps at some point you need to take stock and work out where you are going jobwise; you seem to have studied but still be at minimum wage), benefits are likely to get more punitive in the future and not less so.

Depending on amount of rent you'd probably get a couple of hundred from universal credit

Most people I know have either had a partner's salary sufficient to support becoming a SAHM, have gone for a full time return to work knowing that until childcare funding / school kicks in they will only just be breaking even - but at least they stay in the work loop, or finding part time work that fits around partner's hours and any other free family childcare available. We did the latter, and it was hard at times - but ultimately was what we needed to do and worked out okay. Maybe have a good look at what hours you could work and what jobs might fit that and come up with a plan from there.

I got round the dilemma of childminders when mine were little by working nights while my ex worked days. It was hard work but saved relying on anyone else.

Now I'm a single mum of 3 I do get tax credits but that's to top up my full time wages.

Could working around your partners hours work better?

And this is why people want Labour back in power so that people can have a champagne lifestyle without lifting a finger.

Welcome to Britain 2019.

Confused as to why you’re only on NMW when you presumably have an education.

Some thoughts:

Could you work evenings or weekends instead until the free childcare hours kick in and alleviate some pressure?

Have you thought about retraining or going back to uni? I have a friend who recently did a project management qualification to get herself a project assistant job, with a view to working her way up. I think the first job she’s landed is circa £25k which isn’t bad return on investment for a few hundred quid on a course!

Personally I wouldn’t go down the UC route, it’ll be even harder to get a good job with a gaping hole in your CV and you’ll be resigning yourself to being low earners forever. Do you have any career aspirations? What do you want to be “when you grow up”?

You’ll also be at the mercy of the system which, if you look at posts on here, seems to be incredibly flawed and put you in a vulnerable position.

You’ll only be “just breaking even” for a couple of years at most, at which point you could be looking at improving prospects and will start to pocket more and more money. If you resign yourself to UC now once the free hours kick in you’ll be looking around for your first part time minimum wage job again.

"If childcare costs are too high the way you plan to do it, you need to plan to do it differently" - what my mum said to me 20 years ago.

She was right.

We did. We did alternate shift patterns - DH had the higher earning daytime job, I worked nights and Sunday, always one of us around for the kids.

If you think that paying for one nursery place is high, what if you have more children? twins? Life goes on, you make it work for you.

£30 a week is £120 a month into the family pot. Plus - if you are working, tax credits may open up depending on circumstance. Remember you will also have child benefit going into the pot to help support your child. That is what? another £80 a month...

Head down plough on, find a way that works for your family - you are not in it alone.

Hi OP, hope you’re still reading.

I’d think about this very carefully.

Yes you night we’ll be entitled to some UC/whatever (I don’t know).

However also think about what else work gives you apart from a salary.

I gave up work five years ago for a life on benefits as my autistic son was struggling massively and I was a single parent.

While o don’t regret the decision I made at that time I must admit to missing the benefits of work, adult conversation, banter with work mates, occasional nights out with them etc. It just gave me something extra that I now miss.

Thankfully I am hopefully returning to work next year ...trying desperately to get DS settled in college at the moment and it’s been a disaster meaning a fight with the local authority for a specialist placement in a college specific for learning disabilities.

I miss work, I miss contact with other people and I miss the sense of purpose I had with it all.

My sister fell pregnant accidentally at 19 and worked in nurseries so she could bring her child to work. She studied part-time while doing this and so when her child was school age she was able to get a job in the career she wanted. Your other option is to work from home (call centres do this for example) or work nights or weekends while your partner looks after the baby.

Just read my post back and “Confused as to why you’re only on NMW when you presumably have an education.” sounds awful. What I mean is OP alludes to university and hasn’t mentioned any disabilities or supporting other family members. I realise not everyone on NMW has no education, but I’m confused as to why someone who says they’ve been working/studying for years hasn’t managed to obtain anything even a little bit more.

Dh was made redundant a few years ago. Universal credit deemed we were not entitled to anything except job seekers and child benefit. I was working part time for approx £700 a month.
So not sure you would get anything since you are choosing to leave your job.
If you have been receiving enhanced maternity pay (more that statutory) then check your contract as many say you must return for a minimum period of time or have to pay the difference back.

Op you could work evenings or weekend. Supermarkets will be looking for some staff for Christmas. So your partner will be there to be with their child.

NRTFT but the only way to find out is by using a site called ‘entitled to’ it’s brilliant and really helpful. You do not have to return to work until your child is at least 3yo so please don’t feel pressured, your baby is only 6 months and these times are precious. I had to put my 1yo in full time nursery as we had no other choice and I will regret it for the rest of my life as I can’t get that precious time back. You do what feels best for you. Even if you only get a £100 a week top up from UC you can legally work for 16 hours a week without it affecting your benefits. So you could find something online like transcribing or web research if you’re good at that stuff. Some call centres even let you work from home