To wonder how you get by on SSP?

[CanItReallyBeSo]

Posting for traffic...

Mate of mine has chopped off the end of several fingers at work and been off for three weeks now. Going to be a few more as needs an op and his job is quite physical (construction).

He told me today he's only getting SSP which would go on for up to three months, although he shouldn't be off that long. Looking online it's only £88 a week and taxable. His monthly mortgage is £1200.

How do people with a normal lifestyle get by in the fallout to an industrial accident? Seems only option is using savings or accruing debt. Even UC isn't much extra I'm assuming.

And to add I wasn't talking about OPs friend - that would have been solved with IP.

We had to take out income protection with our morgage years ago. I guess that isn't the case these days

Income protection insurance premiums are usually fairly high regardless and many people don’t ever use it. It doesn’t cover getting the sack or redundancy. I think maybe 5% of people have it.

Critical illness is cheaper but obviously only covers you for a period of time & it doesn’t cover you for every illness eg many don’t cover cancer unless it’s a certain severity.

What's different about Met Life? They don't look to offer anything for chronic illness particularly. Hospital cash plans look to pay for medical fees - thankfully with the NHS I only need pay my prescription certificate! But what I can't get is any sort of income protection to supplement SSP, which is what this thread is about.

And yes, IP could have helped the OP's friend - assuming they could get it and don't, like myself and others on this post, have any sort of underlying health conditions that effectively exclude them from accessing it.

You could get an alternative- there are loads. If you see a good FA or broker they'll find you something. If you've had the condition lifelong and could never have had IP then I feel for you but for the majority they developed a condition and would have been ok had they set up IP before getting ill. Which is what I'm banging on about. There are always people who are the exception to the rule.

Yep silly me I should have got critical illness cover before developing diabetes at the age of 15....

But could you not use the same argument to abolish Jobseekers Allowance? That'd save a lot more money.

I thought I explained it was a friend?

Yes, we've don't toolbox talks at the company I work for (not the same employer as his) but some are just to avoid injury rather than to cover arses.

I could be wrong but I'd have thought you'd struggle to get a payout for stepping in a pothole while not watching your step.

🙄

Well, happy ending as far as can be. The boss has returned and said he's going to work something out for him. 🙌

Sorry @CanItReallyBeSo this isn’t a happy ending for a life changing injury. The boss will just slip him a couple of quid to get him over the next couple of weeks

he really needs professional advice