Universal credit whilst on maternity leave?

[MissLux]

Hi ladies 💐

I’m expecting my first baby in 3 months and before I found out i was pregnant i never really knew much about the maternity part after the birth of the baby.
Was mostly baffled about the figure you're supposed to live on, pay bills and raise a baby whilst on maternity leave when I spoke to HR.
Employers are basically low key trying to put nee mums back to work as not many people would be fortunate enough their husbands compensating for the loss of (almost a whole!) salary..

Anyway, rant about that aside, my actual question is am I entitled to claim UC after my baby is born until I get back to work ?

Im contracted on 37.5hrs a week (Work for the NHS emergency services - shift work)
Never claimed any type of benefits. My salary is ok usually but maternity pay will only cover like 2/3 of my rent.. How do you survive on that?!

Thank you in advance ❤️

Are you not entitled to nhs maternity pay if u have been there a year you should be. Without knowing your and your partners earnings its hard to say what you would be entitled to there are lots of benefit calculators on line have a look at those.

Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP)
SMP for eligible employees can be paid for up to 39 weeks, usually as follows:

the first 6 weeks: 90% of their average weekly earnings (AWE) before tax
the remaining 33 weeks: £151.20 or 90% of their AWE (whichever is lower)
Tax and National Insurance need to be deducted

Yes you are entitles to universal credit for the duration of your maternity leave. We claim it. Use the entitled to website to do a 'quote' (for want of a better phrase) and put in what your circumstances will be then. However, if you mortgage rather than rent, this may have different rules, I'm not sure.

It depends on what your combined income will be. Its not an automatic income top-up.

I work for the NHS as well. The maternity package is very very good so not sure what you are on about. You can have 52 weeks off, last 13 weeks are unpaid. You can save your annual leave to take at the end/beginning of your maternity.
Also due to covid you wont be required to work past 28 weeks (unless you can work from home) on FULL PAY. This is universal across the whole of the nhs.

The first 8 weeks are full pay.

Then 18 weeks half pay PLUS SMP which plumped my wage up to almost full pay.

Then 13 weeks just SMP.

The last 13 weeks are unpaid. This is when most women use up holiday or return to work.

SMP (Statutory maternity pay) is currently £580 a month.
You've have had 6 months (even longer if you take into account ttc) to do a bit of research and save a bit of money. That's what people usually do. My husband wasn't able to fund me during my maternity leave either so I had to save up some money. I used savings to cover the deficit to be able to have 10 months off.

For my experience please don't plan babies to then expect to be on the same salary.

Me and my DH have planned for our third and started saving for my Mat leave before TTC.

I get 6 weeks full pay and then 12 weeks half way (local authority perk) and then SMP for the remainder of the time up to a year.

So no - I'm not eligible for UC - the SMP and even half pay won't cover my bills. So you plan accordingly. If you can only afford 6 weeks off paid, then that's what you get. You go back to work as and when you need to and can afford it.

I'm hoping to get at least ten months, a month of that with be AL, and the other 9 months off I'll have to save beforehand and budget accordingly.

Any UC entitlement will be based on your joint salaries, whether you pay rent, your age etc. It is not automatic entitlement. You will be able to claim child benefit if neither of you earns over 50K.

@Pearsapiece

Yes you are entitles to universal credit for the duration of your maternity leave. We claim it. Use the entitled to website to do a 'quote' (for want of a better phrase) and put in what your circumstances will be then. However, if you mortgage rather than rent, this may have different rules, I'm not sure.

It completely depends on peoples circumstances, rent, savings etc.

OP I'm in the same boat (and funnily enough I work for NHS emergency services too). I started late last year so I only get 6 weeks full pay when I start maternity leave, and so many weeks SMP (which is pittance). I'm going back after 3 months.

My plan is to not worry too much about benefits until the 6 weeks full pay is up, then I'll be looking at applying for UC. The only reason I haven't done so before is that apparently you need receipts to claim back any childcare expenses (I have a 6 year old), and my daughter's school doesn't provide them, so anyone on UC struggled to claim any money back.

Try the entitled to website to see what you could be eligible for?

The NHS package is indeed slightly better than other but not to the point where you would be saying “I’m ok, I can do this on this amount of money, budgeting will do the trick” when it won’t.
We must be on different salaries and when i spoke to HR and got my breakdown (I’ve asked them to spread out the OMP so I can have a stable income and not plunge into £600pm and be left homeless) i was shocked hence my question on here.
I appreciate your answer but my OMP+SMP won’t ever cover my rent, let alone bills that come with it.. and I also look after my grandmother (not disabled)

If you have relatives or friends that can help you with money, rent (or live with them?) - I personally don’t..

Thank you to anyone that actually answered my question and didn’t just bater me with judgement about why am I having a child with without being financially stable or else.

JustFrigginNameChange - Oh what a coincidence!
have you asked your HR to evenly spread it throughout the period you want to take leave for? Just to see which one your be better off in your situation and then decide.
Although it’s not a huge difference it provides a more stable flow rather than 1-2 months of full pay and then suddenly dropping, and then even further more down the line..

OP, what are you going to do when you go back to work in terms of childcare? Because unless you have can't to look after them for free, even with childcare vouchers or UC if entitled to some help, it will be a significant cost, that might mean not being that better off than whilst on maternity leave.

I too work for the nhs & am 14 weeks pregnant (3rd baby whilst working for the nhs) whilst I agree the mat pay is better than private companies youre hardly Rolling in money

What band are you op?

Im trying to save now- I appreciate you only have 3 months until baby arrives but save what you can.

Dont overbuy, all these fancy things arent needed-changing table etc. Rein the newborn outfits in my previous 2 lived in sleepsuits for the first month or so.

As I cant work after 28 weeks (covid rules) I will only be on basic pay (no enhancements) so I pay to apply for UC too if needed.

@VEGAS2016

I too work for the nhs & am 14 weeks pregnant (3rd baby whilst working for the nhs) whilst I agree the mat pay is better than private companies youre hardly Rolling in money

What band are you op?

Im trying to save now- I appreciate you only have 3 months until baby arrives but save what you can.

Dont overbuy, all these fancy things arent needed-changing table etc. Rein the newborn outfits in my previous 2 lived in sleepsuits for the first month or so.

As I cant work after 28 weeks (covid rules) I will only be on basic pay (no enhancements) so I pay to apply for UC too if needed.

You will not get a child element on UC for a third baby, only for the two you already have.

I didnt say I would get it for the 3rd baby did I? Im aware of the 2 Child rule. If needed I would claim for the house hold, is that better?

You did ask how people manage. If they think money is going to be tight they plan ahead. They work out how much money they will have and start saving up. They check to see how much benefit they would be entitled to.

@VEGAS2016

I didnt say I would get it for the 3rd baby did I? Im aware of the 2 Child rule. If needed I would claim for the house hold, is that better?

Wow ! No you didn't but I was just saying in case you didn't know the rules and were banking on 3 child elements in your calculations. With two adults working even with one on a slightly reduced income with no enhancements, there may not be entitlement.

Of all of my post thats the thing you decided to comment on funny that

Yes 2 adults working one low wage (lost job due to covid & picked up the first job that came along) but im only part time so my maternity pay will be based on that. We live in a high rent area.I have already done the calculations & there would be an entitlement but like I said i am trying to save prior to that.

If somebody's rent was really high and they had to claim UC would the rent cap some authorities have in place still apply even if the claim was temporary like for maternity leave.

Congratulations on your pregnancy.

Just to clarify, are you single? You don't mention having a partner and you refer to "my rent" (rather than "our rent") so are you worrying about paying the bills by yourself?

"The NHS package is indeed slightly better than other"
NHS enhanced maternity pay is more than "slightly" better than other employers; it's significantly better. Many mothers are entitled to SMP only. So please don't underestimate your good fortune there.

I advise you to use the benefit calculators at Entitledto.co.uk and/or Turn2us to work out whether you will be eligible for UC and if so how much you will get. Alternatively if you would like help with the calculation, you could contact Citizens Advice and ask them to work it out for you.

"I also look after my grandmother (not disabled)"
Do you live with her or visit her to do the caring? You say she is not disabled so presumably she is not claiming any disability-related benefits (the mostly likely one would be Attendance Allowance)? I'm not sure how this is going to affect finances but it's very likely that you'll have less time and energy to look after her when you have the baby.

@VEGAS2016

I too work for the nhs & am 14 weeks pregnant (3rd baby whilst working for the nhs) whilst I agree the mat pay is better than private companies youre hardly Rolling in money

What band are you op?

Im trying to save now- I appreciate you only have 3 months until baby arrives but save what you can.

Dont overbuy, all these fancy things arent needed-changing table etc. Rein the newborn outfits in my previous 2 lived in sleepsuits for the first month or so.

As I cant work after 28 weeks (covid rules) I will only be on basic pay (no enhancements) so I pay to apply for UC too if needed.

I’m band 5, still isolating as I’m high risk (immunosuppressed) and usually frontline on emergency ambulances however due to being pregnant they haven’t found a suitable position for me whilst being pregnant :) (under review every few weeks) Still getting full pay with the enhancements which I’m lucky to get.

I still haven’t bought anything - I think that will be done towards the very end and I agree I wouldn’t buy expensive things too 😁

I think maternity pay is almost always a HUGE shock to people exploring it for the first time, if they've not had friends / family go through it and share info before.

Before you're pregnant or TTC, there's no need to dig out the details, and in my (private sector) experience, employers don't make their schemes public so you would never know without asking specifically.

I think it would be much better all round if employers where obliged to make their schemes transparent on at least their internal websites. Would be helpful for all - and men in particular would be shocked at the figures, i think.

I've just remembered this is really helpful
www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/baby-checklist/

Hi op. I know it’s been a long time since you posted but did you get any help?

i work for the nhs but work part time so wondering if it’s worth to apply

Hi

I did, yes. I got UC.

after my maternity leave ended I took 3 months paid leave that I had accumulated and afterwards I took 1 year unpaid leave (but I’m still classed as employed)

im due to go back to work in April.

Since the baby’s birth I have gotten UC and will probably continue getting it as I’m a single parent and his nursery fees alone are £1700 full time. UC only gives up to £650 towards the nursery .. better than nothing I guess.

I also get 15hrs free a week from when he turns 2.

When he is 3 I will be getting 30hrs free because I will be working full time.