Go PT and get UC or not?

[Whunt18885]

Hi

My wife and I recently (15 wks ago) welcomed twins into the family so we now have 3 kids total instead of the 2 expected!! Its been fab albeit hard work.

Anyway she is on Mat. leave at the mo from a £31k a year job and I am still working FT doing my job. I earn £25k a year however I am due a pay rise so expect that to go to £26k in April.

Anyway when my wife's Mat leave ends later this year she will need to go back to the office at least 3 days a week and work 2 days from home, I mostly work from home but I am usually on various site visits throughout the day.

With that in mind we are likely going to need to put the twins into nursery and even with the 15 hours free per twin and the Gov childcare account that tops up 20% and the non means tested child allowance thing that we get we are still looking at £300 a week in fees!

So its the age old question should one of us quit or not.

However given both of our careers rely on us both 'keeping our eye in' as it were I was thinking maybe I could go part time either in my current job or within a similar role part time elsewhere, I have 17 years experience so I don't think I will struggle to find a suitable role even part time.

I did a check just to check and basically based on working 16-18 hours a week part time and my wife returning to work full time and us paying £300 a week childcare fees I would end up with £1200 universal credit top up which given the after tax salary of say £900 a month would give me a total of over £2k a month.

If however I stay working full time I would be on around £1800 after tax but we would still need to pay £300 a week in childcare and the UC amount is significantly lower.

Based purely on the maths it would make no sense for me to stay working FT when I can work PT and effectively get more £ than if I was FT and still have more flexibility to spend more time with the kids, do more stuff around the house etc.

My only concern is that we wanted to move house next year when the mortgage rates drop (hopefully) and I wonder what the bank would think about effectively porting our mortgage with an extra £80k borrowed to get a bigger house.

Our combined income if I went P/T would be around £46k a year which is much less than the £57k if I stay full time however we would be borrowing 'only' an extra £80k and given our perfect track record I cannot see why TSB would refuse but I simply don't know!

Any advice from anyone who has made a similar move?

Do you have a mortgage?

If that was one of those online checkers they are notorious for being inaccurate. I would double check but if you own and earn £42,000 you are unlikely to be entitled to anything.

So much for benefits being a safety net for when it can't be avoided. Won't someone (from the benefits department) along the way ask why you decided to go from full time to part time and be subsidised for it?

You can get £1200 in UC because you chose to go PT?

I think your figures are very wrong there.

With that in mind we are likely going to need to put the twins into nursery and even with the 15 hours free per twin and the Gov childcare account that tops up 20% and the non means tested child allowance thing that we get we are still looking at £300 a week in fees! £150 per week per child is very reasonable

If you want a mortgage at a favourable rate you need the highest earned income you can get

No one is suggesting it's not. The OP is asking about going PT and getting UC not questioning the care home fees

We don't get that much UC and we earn well under what you and your wife do

Also, would love to see the expression on the UC advisors face when you announce you have gone part time to be entitled to benefits

Just seen you have a mortgage. I doubt you will be entitled. Sorry.

It was the "!" It's not absolutely shocking that a nursery for two children will cost them £300 a week so I don't know why it's a ! To the op

That amount of UC does sound roughly correct based on the details given, however it looks like you would also be entitled to a fair amount of UC based on you both working full time as well. Yes you would have more flexibility working part time but your combined earnings and UC would still be more overall working full time.

Great idea - cut your hours, enjoy those two days at home while everyone else who is working their arse off subsidises your lifestyle.

No they won't. It is way inaccurate.

They earn double what we earn (mortgage, two kids) and the most welcome get is £350 a month in UC.

I think UC might have some questions to ask though?

So you get to work part time but your poor wife who has actually birthed two humans, as well as being their primary carer for the first year of their life, has to go back to full time hours? Will you be doing the lion share of the house work, childcare and everything else?

Some of the comments.... op ignore the benefits bashing. I'm a single parent to twins and completely understand. It isn't that you want to sit on benefits and not work, its about making the best situation financially that you can.

There's a universal credit support group on Facebook that I suggest you join which will give clearer numbers and be a little kinder than mumsnet.

However, you are always better earning more than not on universal credit except when childcare is taken into account as you are better on uc limiting wages than paying the full childcare bill yourself sometimes. (This is what I do as nursery fees are more than I earn.) UC will pay up to 85% of fees which can sometimes make working part time more beneficial.

The benefit calculations are usually ok as a general idea but I highly recommend that Facebook group. Good luck!

Sorry but you'll both be expected to work 30 hours as the free 15 hours for children 9 months and older is coming in in September.

Absolute sea of judgement and ill informed ignorance from commenters here.

You have young twins. In Universal Credit one of you can stay out of work as a carer (ie SAHM/D) until they're 3. After the first year the person not working would need to start doing stuff to find their way back into the workforce once the youngest is 3.

Reducing your hours as you suggest shouldn't raise any eyebrows in UC but given you're homeowners and not renting £1200/month is about three times what I'd expect.

Don't know how your plans interface with free childcare; not my subject.

Can one/both of you retrain into something that pays more? Less than the national average after 17 years isn’t great and kids only get more expensive.

Wow. Mums shouldn’t have to be the default parents and stall their careers just because they birth them. It would be better for women in the workplace generally if more men did this, actually.

OP’s wife is the main earner here. Nobody questions when women stop working because they aren’t the “main earner”. 😡

@OneMoreTime23 I couldn't give a shiny shite who is the main earner. The OP has focused entirely on himself, what he's been thinking, not mentioned at all how his wife is feeling or if any discussions have taken place. Nor any indication of what working 'part time' would entail, other than being able to get UC and pay less child care. It's completely disingenuous to disregard the physical role of a mother in growing, birthing and being the primary carer of a child (let alone twins +1 older child) just because she earns more.
I'm not convinced this thread is genuine anyway. The figures are way off and it reads like fiction. Surprisingly the OP hasn't bothered to return and answer anyone's questions.

Except they wont - especially if op's wife is working full time.

As if it's that easy to retrain with three young kids. Most retraining for better paid jobs entails possibly doing another Uni course or masters which is likely unaffordable if they will already be struggling.

In fact, re reading the OP, he isn't even thinking of doing this to save money on child care. He's still on about sending the twins to nursery for the same amount of time/cost as if both parents were still working full time...

I’m studying (not retraining) whilst working more than full time and being away from home for half the week. Mat leave with both partners at home the majority of the time should allow some learning to happen.

My mum did her masters while my sister and I were tiny by staying up all night on a Friday (knowing my dad could have us on Saturday).