Where can I seek help claiming maternity allowance?

[SundayLunchHappy]

Hoping for some advice as I go from confused to angry to crying over my iPad which is neither constructive or healthy.

Bit of background. Finished full time job in January as redundancy was imminent, I hadn't been there long enough to qualify for it and my heart was no longer in it. Within a week of finishing I signed up with a teaching agency and begun regular days at school until the summer holidays.

However since the summer hols the work has completely dried up and I'm now really worried I'm not going to be entitled to anything when baby arrives in March.

From what I can understand (which is not a lot!) online, I could be entitled to something if I've worked within 66 weeks of baby's due date and paid my ni contributions, two ticks there. However I've also read that your allowance is calculated during an "average time period" to determine what you'd get, unfortunately right now I'm earning nothing though it's not for want of trying!

If anyone can point me in the right direction of help, I'd be very grateful!

I think if you complete this calculator it should tell you. www.gov.uk/pay-leave-for-parents. Or download the full maternity allowance claim forms and they come with grids of dates so you can work it out.

I think MA is a flat rate, so you either qualify or not based on when you worked in the past year or so and earned over the ni threshold. SMP has an element based on earnings during a specified period before the baby is due but that wouldn't apply to MA.

Taking your due date as the 1st of March 2018 (it may well be later, which would be fine), your 66 weeks will be anywhere from November 24th 2017 until 1st March 2018. You only had to have worked 26 weeks of those 66 weeks (and any 1 day in any week is counted as a week's work) and you only have to provide payslips for your 13 best week's pay (again, any 1 day in any week is counted as a week's work) which don't have to be consecutive. You've got plenty to qualify you for maternity allowance .

Here is the government advice for MA.

Thank you SO much for your posts! Honestly it's been the worst day of hormonal garbage I've had so far, I feel like a teenager having an uncontrollable meltdown for no other reason than i just need to.

If I can use 13 of my best weeks then I can use payslips from when I was employed full time towards it too, massive sigh of relief!