To worry about this UC error

[Floflo2]

Hello everyone. I'm a single mum. I work 30 hours a week around the children. I do get a UC top up and I'm greatful for it. I don't know why or how it's happened. But my work has told them I've earned double what I have this month. Which is impossible even if i worked full time to make the figure they have said I've taken home.

So I've just had my statement and I won't be able to pay rent and survive this month without that money. I've messaged my journal and offered to send over pay slips. But I'm worried about this not being resolved.

Has anyone ever experienced this and what was the outcome.

Posted here as I know the traffic is good.

We are currently going through exactly the same.. left message on journal still waiting on reply.

@Thelavha is right. It's a known issue with UC. Same happens when someone's rent is due 4 weekly and UC pay housing element calendar monthly. There ends up being a UC assessment period when the landlord is looking for 2 payments but the claimant only gets one UC payment.

This is completely incorrect, sorry. UC is paid monthly, so 12 times per year. OP will only receive 1 UC payment a month. Her wages are paid 13 times per year, so there is one month where 2 sets of wages are taken into account (as previous posters have explained). It isn't an error, it's just an unfortunate consequence of her receiving wages every 4 weeks.

Just in time for Christmas. I will see what they say mine do usually respond quickly. I am so greatful for help whilst the children are little. It doesn't help my rents so high but I had no options I had to take the only house I was going to get.
I really hope you are OK and get sorted. It's over half my rent money wise so I'm abit stressed out.

I’ve had this when you are paid 4 weekly you essentially get 13 pay packets a year. I found it challenging to budget as UC essentially paid mortgage. Wage was for bills / food/ petrol etc Obviously bills come once a month but food and petrol are weekly costs so it’d be a month of hunting change out the bottom of handbags / back of sofa for milk and eating through the freezer/ random tins. I’m now paid monthly and it’s just easier to budget.

Hi everyone. Can you help me understand this.

The money I get this month is based on 23rd October too 22nd November! So how is that possible to be due to last month as that period was September 22nd to 23rd.

I understand the 2 pay days. But isn't it still based on money earned in those dates?

Why am I struggling to grasp this so much.

I'm going to struggle too. This £600 is a big drop when I have Christmas bills and rent all due. Its really confusing me as I thought it kept rolling from the 23rd to the 22nd every month and you'd be paid on the 30th every single month. It's hurting my brain.

They won’t do anything.

Given your pay dates and assessment period for UC - it will be correct.

They can move wages to the following assessment period if a mistake has been made or you’ve been paid early because of a bank holiday or similar but that’s not what’s happened here.

You’re paid 13 times a year, UC only pay you 12 times.
As long as you’re paid every 4 weeks, you will always have this problem once a year

It's not based on what you earned, it's based on what you received in your bank account - so you got paid on October 24th and November 22nd, meaning you got two months worth of pay in your account during one UC assessment period.

It works in arrears.

October payment based on assessment period 23rd sept-22nd October

November payment based on assessment period 23rd October- 22nd November

Are you paid every week/fortnight/4 weeks?

If I have your figures right OP (and I might not so take this with a pinch of salt) your assessment period ran from 23rd October to 22nd November, during that time you were paid once on 25th October and once on 22nd November. When your assessment period 'ends' on 22nd UC calculate how much you earned and what you are entitled to, to be paid to you on 30th.

This month, UC sees this as you have earned double the amount you usually would because you would usually only be paid one wage during an assessment period, and therefore it leaves you entitled to nothing for during that period of time.

Ahh OK got it it. Think I'm going to have to ask family for a little help and I hate that. Thank you

It's a non-issue, they will redirect it to their investigations team and move the second pay on to the next assessment period where it should be and will pay you the money owed.

If they don't do this in time, it will look like your earned £0 next month and you will get UC as if you don't work that was £800 for me, and they will put a 'back to work' phone call on the journal, again write in the journal that your work situation has not changed but you were paid twice in one assessment period, they will cancel the phonecall. You will get to keep the excess but they will deduct it from future UC payments. So you effectively get a 0% loan but be mindful of stretching it over the future months and not spending it all at once.

It will all work itself out so don't panic.

The assessment period is four weeks,dw got paid from her work two days before assessment period ended.its the council tax I was peed off about most as they have come back and presented us with bill for the next three months and a form to reapply for council tax reduction and this is all over the heads of two days.

I should add we are band A 1 bed flat and council are looking for £180 each month till end Feb and we have no arrears.

Is this true even for those who are paid 13 times in one year? Because shoving it next months assessment period will also show that OP had been paid twice during that period and so on?

@Floflo2
Going forward, you’ll be paid on 20th December, 17th January, 14th February, 14th March, 11th April, 9th May, 6th June, 4th July, 1st August, 29th August, 26th September, 24th October, 21st November, so your UC payment in November 2025 will also be zero as you’ll have been paid twice on the assessment period.

Do all your bills come out monthly? If so, when you get paid, tuck it into a high interest account (I used a Chase account with a saver attached). And I pretend I don’t see it again until the last day of the month, at which point I move it back to my current account as if I’ve just been paid. Your UC will also come in at this time.

By next November you’ll be a whole month ahead so when you don’t get your UC paid, you’ll be able to take £600 out the saver, and still have the rest of a pay packet in there.

It was a tip my manager told me when I joined the railway (as it pays four weekly) was to keep everything still going out monthly and then you’d get a pay packet once a year that had no bills to pay from it.

This will just push the problem into next month and the same thing will happen again when they count that pay plus her 20th December pay. OP gets paid 13 times a year - there will at some point be a month where she gets paid twice, that's just how it is.

This is really good advice.

No, it's not. As you say even if they did this, it just pushes the problem down the road.

This would apply if e.g. OP always got paid on 3rd Friday of the month and sometimes that fell before 23rd and sometimes afterwards. But it doesn't apply to people who get paid 13 times a year.

Apologies my advice was poor and based on my experience looking a the govt website they just expect you to suck it up.

UC guidance

Again, this is wrong. Earnings would only be reallocated to a different assessment period if the OP was paid monthly and received 2 sets of wages in one assessment period. In that case, the earnings could be moved because there would be an assessment period without any wages in which those wages could be moved. OP is not paid monthly. She receives 13 wage payments a year. 11 of the 12 assessment periods will have 1 set of earnings. 1 assessment period will have 2 sets. This adds up to 13.

This isn't true when OP is paid every 4 weeks.

So you are saying you are paid four weekly ? In this case there is nothing you can do about this because you will have 13 paydays a year and there are 12 UC months so there will always be one month per year where you have 2 paydays falling in your UC assessment period.
If you compare it to someone else on the same annual salary who gets paid monthly then you will have had slightly more UC for all of the other 11 months than them. You need to start putting a little aside each month for when this next happens. Sorry I know this doesn't help you now but there is nothing you can do about it.