To be cheesed off with Universal Credit entry fees?

[MaturingCheeseball]

I know it’s been done before, but…

I thought I’d like to visit Chatsworth House with (teenage) dd. The cost is £33 each PLUS parking at £7.50. So £73.50.

Then I saw the universal credit/pension credit/pip etc price. THREE POUNDS. And free parking! So £6.00 for two adults (age 17+).

I do not have 12 times as much money as someone on these benefits. I doubt many people do. I’m not begrudging the disadvantaged a day out, but come on! The price differential is ludicrous.

When I saw the £73 price I just decided we couldn’t go, and so be it. But upon seeing the potential for a £6 entry, it made me feel mugged off.

How interested are you in the house? Why not just drive there (you can park nearby and walk in?) and then enjoy the grounds - I think that's actually free. You could take a lovely picnic. I agree with you, it does seem a bit unfair but I always think, well I can't afford to do that but what can I do and focus on that? There are only a couple of interesting homes that I have thought are actually worth the exorbitant entry cost unless youre really interested in history. I know this isn't what you're saying here but you could also write to them and explain your predicament and see what they say.

It’s 100% not. What’s there to be jealous about?
Pissed off, and rightly so, that I have to pay 12 times more but not jealous.

Imagine if they did this bollocks in supermarkets, there would be civil unrest.

There is a stipulation about not deliberately lowering your income to increase your entitlement.

So putting a reasonable percentage of your income into a pension would be acceptable and they would work on the taxable income figure on the basis that putting money into a pension is a reasonable expense. However if you room the poss and put all your salary in that would obviously be rejected. I don't know how they draw the line.

Chatsworth is a charity, it is not profit making. That lazy AI search is just showing the operating expenditure. The “surplus” has to pay for all capital expenses. For a house like Chatsworth that’s going to be a HUGE amount - just think how much it would cost to replace the roof or repair all the windows.

As a physically disabled person there's also the issue of accessibility. I'd be really pissed off to pay full price and only be able to access half because it's not accessible

I'm eligible but chose to pay full price online for Zoo tickets as I couldn't face the humiliation of having to present my 'proof' at the desk in front of DCs and friends that we went with. My secret shame and sense of inadequacy cost me £40 that day.

Does anyone objecting to this discount think the standard entry price at Chatsworth would be reduced if the discount wasn’t available? Either you can afford £33 a head or you can’t, that decision is independent of what other people are paying.

I do agree with reduced pricing but 90 % discount is ridiculous.

Yes there's a poster who posts regularly on this site and claims PIP( has made no secret of it). She also brags about her 12 buy to let properties that she owns and her multiple investments. Sorry but it's rubbish that someone like her can visit Chatsworth for £3.

Most UC claimants work, you can't claim UC and not work unless you have a child under 2. You can't just work 12 hours on UC and claim either. You have to work at least 30 hours a week if you have a child over aged 3 and more hours when they're over 12.

Have prices risen to take that into account? Seems not.

In 2023, before the tickets were introduced, it cost £32 for an adult to visit. With inflation, that is the equivalent of £34.44. Prices are actually cheaper in real terms than they were before this was introduced.

There are around 600,000 paid visitors a year. There are 14,000 UC tickets available. That’s around 2% of their paid visitors. The house is never 100% full, 100% of the time. These tickets are not reducing the number of fully paid visitors, they are in addition to. CH are making more money by encouraging other people to visit, who wouldn’t normally visit. I can’t say for certain, but In would bet my house there are more UC tickets available during non peak times than there are at peak times. If you go on the website and look for today, you can book full price tickets any time between now and 3.30. UC tickets are sold out.

If OP is desperate to visit, she has 4 months to save 50 quid which would be the cost of an off-peak ticket. But I suspect she is simply here to whine about poor people having access to the UK’s cultural offerings.

That’s us right now. DH was made redundant over a year ago and is still looking for work (software designer) He’s managed to find a temporary minimum wage cafe job that’s about to come to an end. The UC payments we get don’t cover the bills when he’s not working and We used up all our savings to supplement the UC payments to pay all the bills and mortgage. We don’t get the housing element of UC so no help with mortgage payments so about £500-£600 a month less than if we rented.

I actually do remember when nurses were getting 10% discounts through covid, there was a lot of jealousy there too.

Some people simply cannot stand others getting something they don't. It's like being back in school sometimes.

Pip and dla are not means tested so the concession is not just for ‘poor’ people. My late dh got dla and we had a joint income of £4k a month 8 years ago.

Agreed I think offering discount for certain criteria is fine, but would it not be better to say it’s £10 or £20 rather than basically free or extortionate!

this isn’t a UC bash I used to to help my income when I started my business after being made redundant was thankful for the help and any discount I could get and I am now happy to pay my way but I don’t see why I should be ripped off so someone else can get it extremely cheap

If venues can offer such a hefty discount for benefit claimants why can’t they lower their prices slightly in the first instance for everyone? £33 a head is astronomical imo! Add parking, food, drink etc and it’s an expensive day out.

But they aren't all on low incomes. My friend is on UC. Not a huge amount because her income is decent so it only rips up by about £50 a month (plus the maintenance she gets from her ex husband who is on 100k plus doesn't count in the calculation).

She's sticking to working four days because she also gets the Scottish child payment and her kids will qualify for contextual offers for uni because they are deemed to be from a poor background purely on the basis of the UC.

Her kids go on multiple foreign holidays a year. Mine have never been on a plane and while they have a decent life, they have access to far less cash than these kids who benefit from a wealthy dad.

So yes, seeing her get discounted entry for everything would seriously piss me off.

My other friend who is genuinely on a low income on the other hand would be really glad if this.

It like pension credit, it sweeps in a big chunk of those who may only get tiny amounts but it stacks up other opportunities that those just above the threshold don't have.

I am on UC due to life-long disability. I've been ill since I was a child. I don't have a car and I couldn't drive even if I could afford one (which I can't) as I suffer from seizures. So despite being apparently entitled to reduced rate days out, I could never take advantage of it as I would have no means to get there in order to take advantage of the 'free parking'. I am also usually too unwell to be able to spend the day out like that and if I did then I'd be stuck in bed for days after. I know other chronically ill/disabled parents in the same situation as me.

I find it sad that there are people who think I have no self-respect and am lazy because I'm forced to claim benefits. I consider myself very fortunate to live in a society where we have a benefit system for people like me to be able to survive.

My best friend works full time and receives UC - she fled DV and is in a private rental due to lack of social housing. I wouldn't begrudge her a day out with her children.

Yep.

Chester Zoo did £1 tickets over the Christmas holidays and it was nice to be able to take my disabled son and scope it out without paying full price.

I've learned the hard way that 'accessible' means different things to different places.

Minimum PIP is £30 a week. That's what my friend gets and he has heart failure and out of control diabetes. I get it for autism and that is all I get.

Oh for anyone interested, if you're a member of the National Trust and you're on PIP (or have a diagnosis of something relevant), you can ask for an Essential Companion Pass so that anyone accompanying you can get in free. I've needed it as I've been too anxious to drive to the local NT place on my own.

And don't you dare think you're superior in any way to me or anyone else receiving benefits. You realise that you could become ill at any moment? And if you didn't have anyone to support you, you'd need to claim benefits. Which let me tell you is not very easy when you're ill and stressed. In the future your children might be unemployed or ill and you might not be around. So surely knowing that they would have some sort of safety net should be a comfort to you. It isn't much of a safety net but it's still just about there at the moment.

Chatsworth House are an independent organisation and a charity, so they decide their pricing and who to offer concessions to. If you think that they're getting it wrong, then a. write to them and complain, b. write to the charity commission who regulate all charities and complain. It's not a government initiative.

It's disgusting. But you'll get a load of ppl on here saying you are making that up!

There are plenty of us on UC with mortgages. How do you think we managed?

Are you aware of the support for mortgage interest scheme on UC? it can help to pay mortgage interest but is like a loan. May be worth looking into. I hope things improve for you soon.

Pissed off. Jealous. Both ugly.