AIBU to be angry about the benefits system

[Daffodilsinfebruary]

I have recently discovered by using a free, independent benefits calculator called entitledto that had I applied for Universal Credit over 2 years ago, me and my family would be over £16,000 better off.

I had assumed that benefits were for either single-parent families or people unable to work due to disability.

The majority of our savings would have been from claiming 85% back in childcare costs. We also would have had a payout of over £200 each month in addition.

For context, we bring in just shy off £4,000 a month. I thought this was a very reasonable income and we would be entitled to nil.

I feel angry that we did not know about this. A friend of mine who I met through our children attending the same nursery told me she claims 85% back in childcare costs during a conversation in which I complained of my childcare going up £150.

I did further research and 19 billion pounds apparently goes unclaimed every year.

I’ve never claimed benefits in all my life and worked hard to get on the property ladder.

should I be angry that we didn’t claim, or take it in my stride.

I wonder how many other families who could have claimed but haven’t.

@Tomsthumbs your posts abhorrent.

It's beyond me.

Clearly! You have perfectly demonstrated your lack of understanding and comprehension skills. Many are forced to give up work, including far more lucrative careers, and rely on benefits when they become carers. Unpaid carers save the state a fortune. They are contributing.

Meanwhile, single disabled people who have to live on £7k a year ESA may be losing £2,800 of that when switched over to UC.

This is why I get so angry at families who earn £4,000 a month getting benefits. Yes, childcare is expensive, but it’s still a fucking choice, unlike lifelong fucking disability.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/15/disabled-people-universal-credit-resolution-foundation-report

You absolutely can go out to work and claim carers allowance as long as you are still looking after the eligible disabled person for at least 35 hours a week. The £151 earnings limit is regardless of the hours you work. You can also claim carers allowance for the person in addition to the Local Authority providing paid carers. I’m not talking about direct payments, I’m talking about after a care assessment has been carried out and the persons’ care needs assessed as well as their financial contribution towards care in their own home. As long as the person is in receipt of eligible benefits such as attendance allowance, PIP, etc and the carer is providing at least 35 hours of care in addition to paid LA carers, and satisfies the earnings limit, then carers allowance is still payable. You are confusing Local Authority benefits - carers assessed needs, and direct payments, with DWP benefits. Carers allowance is a DWP benefit and the eligibility rules are totally different from those of Local Authority based care services.

You’ve demonstrated throughout this thread that you have little to no understanding of the benefit system and this last post demonstrates very clearly that you have no clue as to how lots of people on benefits struggle if you describe them all as scroungers. Benefit claimants are tax payers too, which kind of blows out of the water your last sanctimonious sentence.

What an utterly abhorrent post. Unpaid carers are the backbone of this country - without them social care would cost a lot more and we would all be paying higher taxes. Having read your posts, which are ill informed at best, and ignorant at worst, I suggest you go and educate yourself as to what life is actually like as a benefit claimant- especially a disabled one. I was a benefit adviser and worked in disability support for over 10 years and I can tell you right now the vast majority of claimants I supported had very difficult lives. Carers were sometimes in tears because of the isolation and lack of support, and you have the audacity to come on here and make jokes about going to the Bahamas on carers allowance !! It’s shameful.

You’ll never get anywhere on MN with this argument. The level of entitlement on some of the threads when it comes to child benefit and child care costs v disability benefits takes your breath away sometimes. There is absolutely no critical thinking applied and every single time a round of benefit cuts is made and disabled people are in the firing line yet again, the sheeple meet it with almost gleeful approval.

It really is simple. Go to work and let a paid carer come along to earn some money whilst using their professional caring skills.
It's a good place to be at work rather than stuck indoors moaning about not getting enough money

My friend doesn't want outside carers coming in. She tried that, she was lucky to get the same person more than a handful of times.
Her Mum would rather be skint living on carers allowance than have her DD upset even more than she is already at having a degenerative condition.

its simple.

It sure is. You are so ignorant. Many carers are unable to work. Even the government acknowledges that. Not every disabled person qualifies for CHC funding or social care funding and not every carer qualifies for support from social care. Even when they do receive support, many don’t get anywhere near enough funding to work more than a few hours a week. When they do get enough hours that means the carer could work more hours in theory, carers use this time to sleep, complete the never-ending admin associated with caring for someone who is disabled, undertake household tasks they are unable to do while caring for the person they care for, and look after themself (carer burnout is a real issue among carers).

Funding carers for every disabled person so their carer can work full time would cost the state far more.

It might be to do with getting outside of the benefit entitled home and contributing somewhat, even just a teeny little bit.

Or it might be to do with ignorant GFs like you.

have a better quality of life

You haven’t the faintest idea of what it is like to be the carer of disabled DC.

Thanks for this. I get it. Your friend is accepting to stay in her situation and is not complaining about the welfare because assuming they know its A outside carers coming in or B her caring = less money as it is a benefit.
The ones who complain on here and do nothing but expect more and more handouts have not even tried to explore alternatives like your friend has.
Thanks again for this.

have not even tried to explore alternatives like your friend has.

Yet another ignorant statement. And how, exactly, do you know that?

Carers explore alternatives before giving up work in the first place.

I didn't say they don't think the money they get is a pittance. Its a disgrace frankly.

I’m not upset. Challenging your ignorant, abhorrent, patronising posts doesn’t equate to being upset.

But why? Why is being a paid carer seen as a valid career choice, but doing the same thing for barely any money seen scrounging?

FWIW the only funding my friend could get was for 30 mins twice a day. She needs a hoist to do anything, and can only move her arms from the elbow down. This means if she can't reach something she can't have it. So if the carers put her drink out of reach in the morning she can't have a drink until they come back. Even if her mum hadn't been happy to give up work and live off carers allowance she would have had no choice. At least this way my friend can contact her mum (who lives 5 mins away) when she needs something.

Carers allowance is meant for the carer. You clearly have no idea how the benefit system works and even less idea of how local authority care services work. If it wasn’t for unpaid carers the care system would be on its knees, so maybe think about that before you talk about those people in such ignorant and insulting terms.

You might want to think about speaking when ignorant. Because you clearly are. Now you can add patronising too.

Fantastic, I’d love more of your advice. See, I have 2 disabled children, one of whom is considered severely so. He can’t manage a full day of school, he often has to miss school due to his disability and he cannot go to any childminding services either in or out of school due to to level of care needed. My other child misses a lot of school due to a low immune system. They both also needs nighttime care. So what job do you recommend for me? I can work between 9.30am-2pm and have right to leave at any moment to deal with any instances that come up (averaging once a week per child at the moment), meetings, medical appointments etc? Also work around needing to do the most basic of things that can’t be done when the children are around - for example I can’t go to the supermarket whilst they’re with me, or run the hoover, or go anywhere that isn’t part of their very set routine. Can’t even open the front door to people when they’re home, so have to arrange all that for school hours. But thank goodness you’re here to motivate my lazy backside! I absolutely am ‘hiding behind family disability’, it’s so easily done when living the high life for all this money, and all I have to do is not sleep, still have to be giving full physical care to children that are in school, rarely eat a full meal because I’m meeting the needs of others, have wasted thousands on my education for no reason, have an empty cv and zero gratitude for saving social care a huge amount of money for doing the jobs of several health care professionals for 0.1% of the pay.

Id love to see you have to put your money where your mouth is. Because if all familial carers had to go to work, the tax bill for social care would go to the heavens.