AIBU to feel annoyed about discounted attractions for benefit claimants?

[Sheldonsheher]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15721199/Benefit-claiming-families-UK-attractions-working-Brits.html

I know I’ll get slated as the origin is the daily fail but, but this kind of annoys me too! I mean as a single parent I don’t want to pay £60 to go to the zoo either.

Well London zoo fund it via a completely separate national lottery grant

So you want attractions to reduce the costs for everyone, but I don't see how that is linked to UC tickets?
A ticket isn't £100 because a small number of people pay £4.

We both work but there’s not the spare money available to do big days out to attractions. We are not entitled to universal credit so don’t qualify for the discounted entry . We just do cheap or free stuff. It does irritate me.

RSPB offer free entry for 16-25 year olds as they know that’s a hard to engage age group. Do people object to that?

It's not fair mummy! I want it!!

Who is subsidising it?

And you can't even just quit your job, lose your house, chop your leg off and claim to be 25 😂

It’s come in handy for Disney next month. Saved £350

No one - as I explained earlier, it's not taking away from full paying income. It's not one instead of the other. It's encouraging people who otherwise wouldn't go...to go. So even if it's £4, it's £4 they didn't have if the UC family didn't go.

In the same way that if you snuck an extra child into the zoo hidden under your buggy - no one is subsidising that, it hasn't stopped anyone else paying to get in and hasn't cost the zoo more to have them there.

I live in a popular holiday area and quite a few attractions have local resident discounts that work like this. The whole point is to get more people in as it's better to have more visitors who are paying a discounted price than fewer paying full price. And once visitors are there they tend to buy stuff even if it's just an over priced coffee so income is boosted that way too. The discounted prices are only ever at off peak times though. If I wanted to go anywhere this week for instance nowhere has any offers for locals as everywhere is heaving with holidaymakers, but some places run locals' weekends in the winter or have midweek discounts outside of school holidays as it keeps some money coming in when visitor numbers are down. Animal attractions in particular do this kind of thing as the animals still need to be fed and cared for year round so they can't save very much money by closing over the Winter like some other places do.
I think the main purpose of most kinds of discount is to get more bums on seats. If it looks altruistic then that's also good PR but I think most businesses will only do it if it makes financial sense to them. An extra 100 people paying £1 is better than those people not attending at all and if they all buy a coffee or an ice cream then even better.

@MyLuckyHelperIt really is not. All discounts are paid for by someone. They won’t get these people spending a fortune in the cafe! It is PR. People who pay full price subsidise it.

This pretty much sums it up. We are a low income working family and most posters would assume our income (35k before tax) would qualify us for UC but it doesn't. UC is based on circumstances not on wages. We have a mortgage, if we rented we would definitely get UC but we don't so we don't. We will be better off eventually but it doesn't help much right now.

There are many people on low wages who get very little or zero help from the government. If you don't get UC you find the doors closed to pretty much any help.

Great! At last, at last MN supports communism. Away with you capitalist running dogs and away with your petit-bourgeois socialism! Eliminate private property and let there be a community of property.

From each according to his abilities, to each according to their needs.

This isn't how businesses work!

If you sneak a child into a zoo it is stealing because you aren't paying for a good or service that you are using. This means the attraction has to charge those who do pay more to cover costs.

The discounts offered to UC claimants are made available through other people paying full price and covering the costs of the attraction. Without the paying customers the attraction would shut.

ok fine. Point is that they may earn a certain amount but most definitely are not doing 40 hours a week and this is added to the total.
My point is that if you know how to make the system work for you - you can do that. Absolutely not saying thisis what everyone is doing or begrudging the actual needy.

@Lauren1983 Irs also a widely misunderstood concept but it’s been true for decades. Do hang on to the DS f you will have your own property though. It is worth it in the end and you can hopefully step up and get promotions.

From where I'm sitting it looks like the taxpayer is funding a £4 ticket as well as subsidising discount rates by paying £100 a ticket should they wish to go to the zoo.

No they don't! They use the grant and money raised through customers paying full price.

How is it PR when it's been happening for years and apparently no one knew about it until Robert Jenrick and the Daily Mail teamed up to bring 'awareness' to it.

The zoo never know how many tickets they'll sell on any given day. The ticket price doesn't go up when less people are there, does it? If "these people" spend no money in the café, the zoo haven't lost anything, if they weren't going to visit anyway? They haven't stopped full price people from attending. They aren't costing them money to have there. They've just gained £100 from 100 people (for example) that otherwise would've stayed at home.

As has been said more times than I can count now, all businesses offer discounts in some form or another - Kellogg's discounts on Merlin attractions. If you pay full price and I've got a 2 for 1, have you paid more? Of course not. There is no evidence anywhere - or if there is, people are being very coy with it - that prices increased as a direct result of these offers.

Can you give a breakdown of how much each different discount is subsidised by other payers?
UC discount
Child
Oap
Groups
Schools
NHS
Local residents
Armed forces

Best thing is to refuse to pay the outrageous entry fees. Voting with your feet is the best way to see changes 😊 And actually many families will do that anyway because the full price is out of reach for many families who aren’t on benefits

Don't let the pendants get to you. Of course people play the system. I know loads of people that do it.

If you have young children, can work less hours and essentially take home the same amount of money and keep entitlement to other side benefits like the discounted admissions then why wouldn't you? Lots of people don't have such a strong moral code that they are willing to sacrifice time with their kids just to not claim UC.

Firstly taxpayers and benefit claimants aren't mutually exclusive. I'm both.

I can't at this point believe you still think zoo tickets are £100 BECAUSE of a discount scheme. You really do need to either provide some evidence that entry prices increased as a direct result of the introduction of the scheme, or stop harping that particular line.

I absolutely work 40 hours a week. More if there's overtime available.

Thank you I know in the end we will be better off. We don't have a lot of money for extras but the bills are paid so I am thankful for that. We actually work 7 days a week between us so not much time for days out anyway tbh!

It is just frustrating that there is an assumption that low income = instant benefits. Renting, number of kids, disabilities, 1 parent family instead of 2 all make the difference. The amount of money the government expect people to live on is much lower than people think.