To be absolutely fking sick of Universal Credit

[scorpiogirly]

Posted a few days ago regarding being called in for an appointment after work messed my wages up.

Went through all pay slips and could see the mistake, also could then see the basic pay per month which is over the AET. This is after increasing my hours.

So I messaged the work coach and explained what happened and that going forward my pay would be over the AET and asked if I still needed to attend the meeting which is today.

I was told yes as it was under last month. And we can discuss this apparently when I go in. Discuss what? Possible reasons work made the mistake? This is a work search appointment. For which there will be nothing to discuss or put in place as I will be over the AET.

But no, let's still waste my time, their time and also taxpayers money.

I just hate it. The way they make you jump through hoops in order to get the help you're entitled to.

Just a rant really. Does anyone hate UC as much as me?

Have you come across any age gap couples on UC yet. Where one is under state pension age but one is over.

Wondering how its going after the changes to Pension Credit back in 2019

So you would be happy if it was your childs teaching assistant having to do that @Deeperthantheocean

Would you fuck! I can just imagine the AIBU

AIBU to be pissed off that the TA has to keep taking time off for appointments?!!!

I receive UC due to childcare costs. Those that are referring to it as free money and should be eternally grateful would you petition for our local authority jobs to pay us a higher wage so we no longer need to claim please. Partner works full time i work 30 hrs over 4 days (if i increased hours would need more childcare help)

When we started the claim both of us were expected to attend local jobcentre and were both given appointments during our working hours! I managed to rearrange to my non work day and partner had to rearrange to final appointment of the day and arrange to leave work early to attend.

They also made an error one month and didn’t pay the childcare asked on journal about it 3 times and got ignored. Spent whole of my lunch break on phone to them one day for rude advisor to admit issue.

My husband is a TA which is why he point blank said I am working and won't be going to that appointment. You will have to wait until half term for me to attend.

Ah that's good to hear. Absolutely detest MLM's and their whole business model, and hate the way they lure people in who are already in trouble.

Sounds interesting what you're doing, and I hope it continues and picks up to where it was the last time you did it 😊

Surely it's a joint claim anyway?

Yes I do,I am seriously thinking of struggling without them,I've had enough !!!

I’ve had this exact same problem since I’ve had a new case manager. I messaged him over 30 times, each time he would come back and wasn’t even answering my question. It was making me unwell. I even asked him if he was AI at one point. When I called up all they would do was take the details and pass it back to the case manager so I was going around in circles. Eventually he realised his mistake.
he has messed up again this month and over paid me. I don’t have the energy for it all I really don’t. I dread my statements.
All so I can just claim childcare to go to work.

I do think life would be much easier if childcare was properly funded / subsidised like in many other countries.

Same for private rentals.If we invested in decent social housing surely better than paying off a buy to let investors mortgage.

I wonder how many in work claimants are only there due to high childcare/ rent costs.

We recently moved.. New area. New job centre.. No coach...
New rules apparently

..self employed I can't claim home to work milage just job to job... Not what I was told at the first job centre by first coach...

So really I do 2 sets of books.. I for UC and 1 for hmrc... Who do accept mileage.. And they wonder how we get it wrong...

My other half has just been migrated from WTC lost a lot of benefits. As he's over the old UC age limit the local office can't cope. They keep calling him in asking the same questions, he than asks for the manager, sees the same one every time who sorts it out, then a week later has to go in again, wash repeat. He also wants his benefit to go into a third party account as he is having trouble managing money, DWP have done it over the phone for the benefits they administer, not UC, he has to go i and beg them to do it and they took great delight in saying no. Yet another complaint to our MP.

Uc is administered by DWP?

Yes, but most stuff is done by staff at local job centres, unlike most DWP stuff which is done centrally.

Job centres used to be run by the Dept of Employment which was a separate dept entirely. Quite a few people still think of them as separate.

I'm lucky that they mainly leave me alone. But doing it monthly instead of annually can lack flexibilty when it comes to people's finances, it assumes everyone is paid monthly. See all the issues with weekly or two weekly pay. It must be awful if you are paid less often for big jobs. Stopping and starting your UC, pestering you about why you're not working when you are etc. Small bonuses that wouldn't have made any difference spread out over the year are mostly taken off you which is demoralising. Everyone else excitedly planning what they will spend theirs on, I will lose most of mine. I'm not talking about thousands here, I mean the odd £50 or £100. That is a lot when you're on UC and that bit of butter on your bread gives you the strength to go on sometimes. And lets not start on students on UC. The old system was so much better and actually helped people better themselves rather than just trampling them down at every opportunity.