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.

I'm so sorry. I hope your situation improves.
It keeps me awake at night. I am a single income household. It's all on me.

Where did you get 12 hours a week from?

Do you ever wonder about the unfairness of some people earning £100k and some earning £30k? People on £100k can afford everything better

S you are saying anybody earning just under £40k should give up work as they dont contribute to tax and therefore it’s ok?

what about somebody earning £40,100. Should they give up work too? Or is it only people on £100k+ who should work to support anybody else who can’t get a £100k+ job?

This has nothing to do with left or right. If we get rid of UC in its entirety, what do you think would happen? Would everything be affordable entirely in the country? Where does that stop? Pensioners take the bulk of our welfare spending, AND they get free bus travel, concession pricing etc. We could save £billions by cutting their pensions and letting them fend for themselves. Or, and here’s a crazy idea, we could stop being ok with Tesco paying its staff minimum wage so we can have cheaper food and they can make massive profits meaning their staff have to go on benefits. Actually, to “left/right” that for a second, Reform want to do away with the minimum wage entirely, meaning Tesco can pay workers whatever they like, AND they are very unlikely to raise corporate taxes to compensate. So the tax take from employment will be less, the amount of disposable income people have is less which means things like VST receipts are less. Are you ok with that?

The other thing missing from this argument is, generally people who are lower paid, are less well educated. They will be raising a generation of children who are less well educated. Take the kid from the sink estate who never sees anything other than their garden and the poverty that surrounds them, likely to go on to work in the same minimum wage job their parents do, and introduce them to Chatsworth house, sparking an interest in history and that child might start to think beyond their front gate. That is a benefit for the future of the nation.

Off topic OP and might not be any good depending on where you live but if you just wanted to see one of the big stately homes rather than chatsworth specifically, Blenheim (and I believe a few others like Alnwick) charge a similar amount for entry but entry lasts for a year, so you can visit multiple times to make it much better value for money. This also includes all the christmas events when they decorate the house - if you plan your dates well you can even 2 christmases within 1 year's ticket. It's really nice to be able to see how different they look in winter compared to summer as well.

I think the bigger question with pricing is whether when you buy a full-price ticket, are you subsiding these discounts?

For example, standard ticket £20 (£15 running costs and £5 profit)
Elderly Concessions £15 (£15 running cost and £0 profit).

So in this example, if they NEED a minimum of £15 a ticket to break even….and they then start offering some people a UC ticket for £3…where does the £12 loss get offset?

I suspect what happens is that that they male
a calculation and estimate for example
for every 2 standard tickets they sell, they will sell 1 UC ticket, so what they then do is increase the standard ticket by £6 each to cover the loss on UC tickets.

On principle I would not visit attractions where I’m paying a substantially higher ticket price than other people (12x more is ridiculous). They surely must be charging more to offset
the loss, otherwise 11/12ths of your ticket would be pure profit, which seems unlikely as these places don’t run on that kind of profit margin.

It’s fine if an attraction wants to give discounted ‘break-even’ tickets to some groups, but I don’t expect to be paying for other people’s tickets, without my agreement, and without transparency. My own ticket should be paying ONLY for their running costs and allowing for their profit margin.

I suspect OP, this is WHY Chatsworth House is so expensive, you are paying for other people’s tickets!

This is very bad karma op. Someone might be on universal credit because they have a disabled child and they can only work part time due to limited respite care. Hopefully that wont ever be you? Who knows what the universe has in store for you.

OP saw the £73 price and decided they couldn’t go

prices the same for everyone?

sure. But we're not talking about the difference between a 2 bed terrace and a 5 bed detached, or a 10 year old Vauxhall and a brand new Porsche, are we? Those choices could be deemed living within your means. Getting out and about should be possible for everyone, seeing buildings, art galleries, museums etc. of national interest should be possible for everyone. Many of these places are not easily accessible without a car so don't worry, many poorer people aren't going regardless of the discount.

I didn’t know Chatsworth House did this for PIP claimants @MaturingCheeseball , but thanks. We’ve been meaning to go for ages, but now we definitely will. You’ve just saved us a fortune.

When I was on UC, I wouldn't have had £3 to spare out of my ... what was it, £147 per fortnight for all of my living costs? So I agree, it is rather taking the piss.

I think the real point is that people who pay the full price to these attractions are sunsidising those that are claiming the discount.
Most of these attractions are far too expensive for a family, and frankly when my DC were young, these type of attractions were very rare for that reason.

So all discounts should be banned?

As she's talking about an older daughter (hence the adult price), the equivalent would be JSA + potentially Housing element for the equivalent of a cheap 1 bedroom flat. £95+ about £126 in the areas around Chatsworth House according to the internet. That equates to about £11k a year.

Minimum wage for 40 hours a week is £26k.

As you are referring to disposable income, if we assumed that both had exactly the same level of spending on electricity, housing, all other bills, and they were pretty much average, then the person on NMW has around £1500-£1600 extra income spare - a multiple of 12 to 60 times more depending on whether we're comparing somebody who has an expensive PAYG for electric/gas, an energy efficient flat, that kind of thing, and those expenses are £3-400 a month.

The UC claimant has £25 - £124 a month money that is not directly spent on bills with those figures.

It seems quite likely that Chatsworth House used those same figures to calculate the discounted price, too.

so what’s the solution- everybody on the same wage regardless of profession? So where does incentives come into play, What would happen in a society where brain surgeons get paid the same as street sweeper?

It’s not jealousy or pleb-bashing. It’s pointing out that £70 odd quid for a day out for two people is not within the means of many people. Working or otherwise. It should be accessible to all people. Either because working people SHOULD be able to afford the normal entrance fee, or because those who can’t receive a discount. The way it stands most average working families would not be able to afford it. Why make it accessible to only one section of society? It also pisses me off the the National Trust offer massively reduced rates to the over 60s but for a slightly different reason.

Was it in France that spaces for disabled drivers had a sign that said if you take my place will you also take my disability?

No one begrudges a disabled child/family the chance of a day out at a subsidised price.

Read what the OP has actually said instead of reading what you think they’ve said

I don't know. Perhaps you can share how you manage because I am very worried.
UC doesn't seem to cover the bills of a modest home of a single income household with an adult and teenager (in education).

If the vast majority of the population were claiming UC, this scheme would disappear. The government couldn't afford it. Maybe it is time to see if any of us are eligible to claim it?

If Tesco were forced to pay higher wages, they would use more automation and dispense with workers altogether.

My DC saw me going to work for years - or rather they got used to barely seeing me because I was at work. Their dad works, wider family work, they know people need to work

Pride doesn't come into it. Why make my life so much harder for little gain? DC loses out too. I worked for years, I couldn't help being ill. I plan to go back to work soon if I can find a job that works with the childcare available

You have just made up a bunch of numbers and are assuming they are representative to support your guess.

Commercial businesses offer reduced price tickets in limited numbers, usually a very small fraction of annual sales, in order to get bums on seats and benefit from ancillary sales. Its no different from the old pensioner hair cuts on a Tuesday afternoon (traditionally a quiet day in hairdressing).

If you don’t like their business model feel free to complain to them.