benefits advice pleasy weasy lemon squeezy ta.

[sophiecountessofwessex]

will get my dh to go to CAB - there is a local surgery next friday however i thought i would tap into the absolute wealth of knowledge that is mumsnet.

my dh is going to be unemployed soon because of the end of his contract.

i am in full time employment. we have 3 children. one is 16 and himself will be working in June.

right. heres the thing. hes seriously thinking of re-training to be a social worker. he already has a degree and we have done some research and he could go straight into doing a 2 year masters in social work rather than the 3 years degree - becuase he has a degree ( politics)

so, a friend told me that he would be able to get job seekers allowence - something like £56pw. and he would be able to go into further education for a year and travel expenses, course fees and such would be paid - anyone know anything about this?

also will i get more family tax credits to help out? is there a website that shows household income proportionate to WFTC - in definate figures so i absolutley know how much we may be entitled to?

also social work degrees have a bursery - have lookedo n the social work website ( cant remember its name) and it never mentioned a specific figure.

what i need to know is te best rout to go down to make sur our family stays on its feet.

should we claim benefits or should he stack shelves at tesco in he evening with a take home pay of approx £100 pw. and study during the day.

any advice or 'inkings' at all would be much appreciated.

becuase we have made a deal that if he does it for 2 years and we struggle through then i can re-train as a social worker too becuase i despise my job so much.

thank you so much. i will shamelessly bump this as its so important
thank you

Don't have a clue I'm afraid - but maybe it's worth posting in the 'Student Parents' section too. They might have some knowledge.

When i tried to claim jsa a few years ago while i was learning on a flexi course and working pt i was told i didn't apply because i wasn't seeking a job.

Apparently you have to prove that u are looking for a job and they will set up interviews for you to go to which can affect ur claim if u don't go.

\link{http://www.jobcentreplus.gov.uk/JCP/Customers/WorkingAgeBenefits/Incomesupport/index.html\maybe income support is what u mean?}

thanks.

i will post in student parents - good idea bottomknocker

You can't claim benefits if you are a student or if one partner is in full time employment (well in certain circs you can but prob not this one). Go on INland Revenue website and they will calculate how much you should claim in Child Tax Credit and Working Tax Credit.

YOur friend might have been thinking of a JObcentre scheme that encourages people back to work by helping pay for course fees, travel etc but you would have needed to be claiming for a while and I'm fairly sure you couldn't claim for a social work degree.

Good luck but looks like stacking shelves in Tesco for a while. (I'd quite like to do exactly what your dh is planning as my degree is useless so I'm a bit )

P.S I'm not an expert but do know a bit through my job

thats really helpful thanks

You definitely can't get income support if one partner is working full time. What may happen, however, is that if your joint total income declines - and in this calculation your spouse will need to list any grant or loan monies he receives - you may qualify for Working Tax Credit and/or more Child Tax Credit.

If you rent, you may also qualify for Housing Benefit if your low-income.

thank you.

does anyone actually know what the figures are proportional to income - does anyone have a leaflet or anything they can look at and tell me about - becuase the inland rev site bit that works it out is closed due to fraud investigation!

thanks

Working Tax Credit? It tops out at about £14,000/pa income - and that's total for you and your entire family. And yes, they ask what other benefits you are in receipt of. It's meant to lift families out from below the poverty line, that's why it tops out so low.

oh right, thanks ever so much. we cant get that then! but its good to know wont be pionning my hopes on it.

thanks expat

SCW, could your dh get a job within social services or something similiar, then ask for secondment, that why he gets to earn a wage and study too, it will prob take just a bit longer.
i beleive the bursary will be graded according to how many dependants he has, the best course of action would be to ring the higher ed establishment he wants to study at and ask to speak to someone who could tell him how much the bursury would be.

great spacey yes, we thought something similar - its a good idea thanks

As long as your in full time employment you will get wtc as long as your household income is below 15000 (or more if you cliam any disability benfits). You won't however get any help with any childcare costs you have unless you husband is also working over 16 hours.
Income under 15000 will give you CTC of about 75 per week (for two children, may be more if you claim disability benifits for them), you may get more depending on when your 16 year old turned 16. Income over 15000 and less than about 22000 will give you less child tax reducing to 10.50 per week for income above 22000 and less than 50000.

Any sudent income like burserys and student loans also don't count towards your income for CTC and WTC. Only taxabe benifits like incapacity benift, carers alowance and contributions based job seekers (off the top of my head).

But any grant does count towards WFTC, according to their helpline, have had to declare my £2.5k a year maintenance grant, just not my loan.

Try

www.entitledto.com

I'm not sure how accurate it is but it's easier to use than the WTC / CTC site.

I am fairly sure as the others have said that you cannot claim JSA when you are studying.

There is also a useful site called www.I-resign.com which you can out your gross income into and it will calculate your net take home.

HTH

Your Grant shouldn't count, it would count only if you are getting a dependants allowance, as this was done away with years not many people get it. Only taxable income is taken into account when calculating income for WTC, I'd phone back and get a second opinion.

It may be something I haven't though of at the moment but off the top of my head I can't think of any student income that they need to know about. I'll check tomorrow and find out exactly what student income they need to know if you want.

ok please help ( that site was f*cking fabulous btw)

if the inland ev go off last years wages - and i were to go part-time this year - the site says that the final" the final award set by the Inland Revenue will be different from your initial award."

so when it comes to getting you money what does this mean i would get an initial payment for a couple of months then they make it right - of will i have to wait til the next ta year of 06-07 and get teh money they owe me in a lump sum? what does this mean

The initial award you get will be based on last years income from the declaration (whenevr they get around to finalising it) they sent you. This initial award will be the one with the two limits on it (i.e. you must lt the revenue know if you income goes lower than something or higher than something else.)

However you can let them know at any point in the year (even before the give you a initital award and you payments are what they call provisional, basically any time after April) that your income will change (remeber to take into account the full time work you did at the start of the year when working out your new income) At the moment, and I think this is about to change, what would then happen is they would then base a new yearly award on your lower income and pay a lump sum for the part of the year you were gettin lower payments(thats the bit thats changing I think) and then increase the payments for what is left. You then loose any income limits and any change in your income after that will affect you award and if the next change to your income only happens when you do the next declaration they will review the award using you exact income so if this is higher than the revised inomce you may have an overpayment, lower you with have a underpayment.

All of this would only happen if your new income was going to drop below the lower limit on the award if not your entitlment will be the same.

Hope this makes some sense.

I phoned up and you were right 1980scat, the person who told me to declare my grant (on their helpline) was wrong. Saved me several quids I suspect. Thank you!!!

RE: the secondment, Social Services back home used to employ people as family support workers and then fund their degree on day release. They had a few people like that, a way of making up the SW shortfall. Sounds like a good idea.

What I would say Sophie is just go for it. There's all manner of access funds available if you do get really short (from the Uni) and 2 years is nothing! I didn't go back after ds3 was born, and am studying a degree then need to do a PGCE to teach. As soon as I complete NQT year, DH will apply for a degree in animatronics.
He currently works, earning £18K a year, £3k of which goes immediately in petrol to work, and it's tight but very worth it indeed.

The student loans website has a calculator that searches your finance entitlement, try here \link{http://www.studentsupportdirect.co.uk/portal/page?_pageid=1647,467417&_dad=portal&_schema=PROTOCOL\ student finance website}.

When I did my calculation it came through as £300 grant; when I applied I added a letter requesting that my DH's petrol etc be counted as essential costs as he could not workk without it (he is a shift worker and there is no alternative transport), they Okayed that, and it pushed my grant up by over £1k. Worth a go.