To think saving on Universal Credit is extremely difficult?

[FirmGreyMember]

It feels like Universal Credit doesn’t really leave much room for saving once basic living costs are covered. I know in theory people say to put even small amounts aside but in practice it seems very difficult when most of the money goes on essentials.

AIBU to think there’s very little opportunity to build savings on UC?

We are talking about things which all children get free there, not UC claimants. Just pointing out that all these ‘I subsidise other people with my tax’ types are perfectly happy to take child benefit and free prescriptions for their own under-16s themselves. If you read the thread a little further up, you’ll see what I mean.

Cross posted with @PyongyangKipperbang there!

One of my neighbours in her early 60s, claiming UC. She doesn't have enough money to eat after the third week. She doesn't go out or smoke or drink. It's not enough to live on, never mind save.

That pot sure empties quickly, when all you have to live on is £80pw.

It sounds like she is on the very basic rate... about £400pm. Is she also having to look for work?

As said, UC pay rent, subsidise CT, free dental and eye care. I'm assuming you're a single young person so you won't get extras of child benefit, FSMs. So basically you will be given an amount on benefits as an adult and either looking for work or unable to work.

If you were working and paid a certain amount then UC will give you the same and more. The incentive is to get people into a job so you will be better off.

Yes she is and she's looking every day. Low skilled/experience and probably ND. It's not easy for her to find anything.

It is not easy for anyone right now. The job market is awful ATM.
I hope she finds something soon.

The amount varies greatly, I looked it up once and if I was to apply for it (single, no dependents) I’d get my rent paid £800 and then about £450 on top of that. 1250 isn’t very much even for a single person living alone with no dependents when most of that is for housing.

If I had a mortgage I believe I would not get the housing element so shockingly I’d only get £450 a month. I think that’s outrageous. Someone could have worked their whole life and then lose their job and they get a measly 450?

I think it should be like some Europeans countries where I believe people get paid something like 80% of their salary if they lose their job.

I read this right after I posted and this is the exact scenario I’m talking about. Where a single adult living alone will get peanuts especially if they own as Opposed to rent.

Does she own her house? Is that why she doesn’t get the housing element?

She gets her rent paid.

Oh okay so it’s the rent paid + £400 she gets?

ETA: I still do agree £400 isn’t enough for a single person even after rent has been paid.

This is another reason why I argue that UC rates should be significantly higher. Through work I see a lot of people like this. On paper they could be working, but in practice they're very unlikely to find an employer to take them on. So because they have some kind of disadvantage - undiagnosed ND, trauma, alcohol use, loss of confidence, this kind of thing - they're effectively punished by having to live in perpetual poverty. People can say all they like that "there's no excuse for any able bodied person not to work, blah blah blah" but that involves turning a big blind eye to the realities of life. Our supposedly "generous" benefits system leaves a lot of people to rot through no fault of their own.

Don't forget that includes council tax and utilities within that £400.

I'm sitting here waiting for the "everyone on any type of disability benefit gets a free top of the range Audi/Merc/BMW" comments. 😆

Working very hard these days for my massive £27k local government salary topped up by a whole £100 pip a month, so my ADHD brain is a bit too tired to think of any more "truths" about how well off people on benefits are. But would be fun to make sure we have the full Bingo card of freebies that apparently I get.

BTW I do get free prescriptions - but only since I'm in my 60's.
I do get a council tax reduction - because I live alone, luckily they haven't decided that cats (or dogs) class as adult occupants (yet).
And that's it; but I have paid taxes/NI all my life to pay for other people's children, for public transport I haven't been able to use for decades due to it hurting me too much, for various local facilities that I don't use and mostly never have.

Just out of interest, where do you live that they’ll pay £800 rent for a single person? Where I live they don’t pay that for a one-bed flat. The rules are that under 30s can only claim the ‘shared accommodation’ rate of £79 a week, and over 30s can only claim for a one-bed flat at £115 a week.

People think that UC pays your rent. In reality for many people UC only pays just over half your rent. Also my friend is on UC and working and she gets no CT support at all.

Some people have zero knowledge of other people's lives. It's heartbreaking to watch this woman's struggle.

Every council has it's own LHA (Local Housing Allowance) rate, depending on housing costs in that area. If you Google LHA rates you can check what it is for your area.

I totally understand that. I see the same people coming in day in day out, feeling really under pressure from their work coaches to look for basically nonexistent jobs, threatened with being sanctioned, going to food banks - their lives are miserable. Some are able to get volunteer jobs and that helps with their confidence and self esteem but obviously that's not seen as valid in the long term by the DWP. The fetishisation of paid work at any cost that we've seen over the last decade and a half has been immensely damaging to vulnerable people. What right do we have as a society to wreck lives like this?

Yes, I was just pointing out that where people believe that UC pays your rent AND gives you £400 a month for bills/food/etc, the reality for many (depending on area) is that often those two amounts may just cover the rent which means they’re left with nothing to live on.

Wow. I never had enough savings to buy my council flat. A relative helped me and I paid them back when it had to be sold. My mum bought her council house and got a mortgage. The fact that my dad paid her two quid a week and my brother's dad paid nothing his whole life didn't help

People also don't have to be married to have children. I know people who had kids first and got married later. How dare anyone call people on benefits charity cases.

Maybe I’m wrong then and I wouldn’t even get as much as that! If so - yikes that’s even worse.

I stay in Cheshire and I’m over 30.

Yes that’s true. It was even the same for housing benefit.

I claimed for that when I was younger and I only got £200 a month despite it costing me £350 for a room (many years ago) in a flatshare. And it’s not like I was living in luxury or my rent was expensive for the area I lived in.

It’s like they don’t care what actual rents are set at, they just agree to pay up to a certain amount even if that’s significantly lower than what rents are actually are in that area.

I’m pleased for you that you are obviously not in the same position, and that the life choices you made were so firmly grounded in wisdom and foresight, or maybe you’ve just been very lucky.
But mostly, I just feel sorry for you. I may not have made excellent choices, in hindsight, I’ve had some bad luck along the way too. But really, I would rather be in my position financially and still have my sense of humanity, compassion and desire for a more equal society, (in which enough wealth exists that there should be very little disparity in the standards of living between any human on the planet) than live in your self congratulatory bubble.
I hope you never get seriously ill, or live with someone who financially controls you, or abuses you, or have a child who is disabled, or very sick, or lose your partner in an accident and find yourself unable to make ends meet with children, or lose your job and struggle to find another, or have any need for the support I receive.
But one day, something will happen that is beyond your amazing foresight and impeccable planning that will allow you to see that you are no different nor better than every other human being.