Universal credit

[Mani11]

Hi,
Please help me I am really upset I have been asked to provide documents it took now more than 3 month still clame review hasn’t been completed. I am a single mum with my children in universal credit. if children’s father which is not living with us (is not in benefits) pays electric and water bills and occasionally transfers money to my bank account for birthdays or cloths etc. does it makes a problem? I am new in universal credit and not sure about it.
Thank you

It's every 6 months for reviews.

I would take his name off the bills and ask him to transfer you money instead. it’s hard to claim you need the amount of support that a genuine single mother paying everything alone or just with set amount of child maintenance does, If another adult is paying your bills for you.

Bills are on my name.

This is not correct, also not sure what you mean by local housing office these days? Only the DWP make decisions on UC claims, whether at initial claim stage or during reviews.

There is currently no set standard of 6 months. Some claimants have had three in a 12 month period, some as yet have not had one.

No one can have 3 in a 12 month period. Six months is the standard. We’re not allowed to start new reviews if the previous one was less than 6 months ago.

I guess it will depend on claimant's circumstances.

I'm afraid I've had a client who has had 3, had to do all the prep work for the first, it was abandoned and restarted as a 2nd because the UCRT did not complete it in a timely manner, starting it just before Christmas then not moving onto the second call in time for the AP and making the client start from scratch. Then a third before 12 months was up. So to my client it was 3, practically a whole year on repeat of doing the same thing over and over. I supported with a complaint.

Did the complaint go anywhere? Because that absolutely shouldn’t have happened. And the more DWP are called out for not following their own bloody guidelines the better!

Call the child maintainance service. You will get monthly payments and your ex will have his wage assessed each year too.

I havnt heard this before. As he has good income so you mean can I ask them to push him to pay me?

He is not in abut benefits though

Yes it was acknowledged in writing, although a response took a long time, and it was agreed that it fell considerably short of what was acceptable. It was understandably very stressful for the client. We involved the MP as well.

I mentioned in my journal when I first uploaded my documents that if they needed my PayPal statements, I am happy to provide them. Any money in my PayPal account mainly comes from refunds, and I don’t have any other income apart from my part-time job, which I have already declared.
They didn’t initially ask for my PayPal statements, but after reviewing my bank statements, they requested them. My PayPal activity mainly shows purchases, most of which were returned within a short period. Over those two months, I also made small transfers (between £10–£100) from PayPal to my bank account at the end of each month of my money finished in my bank.
There is no additional income or unusual transactions, only purchases that were mostly refunded. After they requested my PayPal statements, I uploaded them, but I haven’t received any updates since then.
I understand how it might look, and I feel a bit embarrassed, but I want to explain honestly: I couldn’t afford expensive items outright, so I two times used PayPal’s instalment option to purchase items, such as a bag, just to see them in person. I would then return them within a couple of days and receive a refund.
My concern is that this might be misunderstood, even though all items were returned promptly and there was no financial gain or undeclared income

Yes call the CMS tomorrow. Does your ex work for a company?

If you go through CMS they check with HMRC how much he earns and they’ll tell you both a figure he is required to pay. He doesn’t need to be on benefits for you to do this. If he’s transferring you money each month for bills it would be worth checking an online calculator based on his earnings to see what you’d be entitled to because it could be less than what he’s already paying for bills but it could also be more

Yes he does

It will be easoer for CMS to start a claim for you. They will work out the amount for you depending on his wage, how many overnight stays he does if any and how many kids.

Thank you,Coconutter24

The PayPal transactions should be fine- spending isn't what they are interested in, and you can explain as above about incoming amounts

This really bears repeating. Speak to CMS and get payments from him on a more formal and regular basis.