Claiming Child Benefit (slight rant sorry)

[sherby]

So I had a home birth around 5 mths ago with DS and completely forgot about claiming cb, well actually I thought it just happened automatically when you registered their birth but anyway I remembered last week and phoned them up for a claim form.

CB Man: Oh its in your bounty pack
Me: I don't have one I had a home birth
CB: You have to print one off the internet then
Me: Um what if I don't have the internet
CB: Well do you?
Me: Yes, but I don't have a printer and surely claiming cb shouldn't be reliant on having access to the internet
CB: Well if you don't have the proper claim form you have to print one off

So I have had to go to the library, book a pc, pay £1.50 to print the form off (15 PAGES) and send it off to them.

Surely it is not right that they should

a, Presume ownership of a pc
b, Presume that everyone has computer knowledge to be able to access these documents, I know lots of people who can barely turn a pc on

Would it really be so hard to make these forms available from the post office

Yes it's rubbish isn't it? I had a hospital birth but didn't stay long enough for a Bounty pack and even if I had I wouldn't have wanted all the other crap interesting information included in a Bounty pack.

I managed to let the person on the helpline assume I didn't have a printer and she quickly agreed to send me a copy, but it was tricky to get her to agree!

don't start me on this. i hav just had the same thing.
I also have no printer, but luckily dp was able to print my form off from work.

it's bloody ridiculous

It is ridiculous isn't it.

Surely they have some kind of responsibility to make benefits etc accessable for everybody regardless of circumstance, especially such a wide ranging benefit

er, they do. its called giving all mothers the bounty pack which contains the child benefit form, and having someone in charge of ensuring that all mothers get the form by having the bounty pack woman in charge ofit.
if youchoose to have a home birth, then it is your responsibility to ensure you get your benefits and those of your chid sorted. not theirs. at least they are providing you with the easy option of printingi t off, instead of having to go all the way to the post office.
and since most babies are born in hospitals it would probly be a great huge waste of paper stcking these forms in the post office, when most people get their forms from the bounty pack.

just give the other stuff from thebounty pack to someone who might actually appreciate it.

Can't the MW who attends a HB come with Bounty packs, or at the very least the necessary paperwork to claim child benefit.

I managed to miss out on 2 years of child benefit because I didn't remember to do it

I am sure my mw brought me a bounty pack in the week after the birth

Pukka i would imagine receipt of a Bounty pack is the last thing on someone's mind when they choose where to give birth! 'Sorry Dh you can't be present at the birth because I want to go into hospital and thereby have a crap Bounty pack full of leaflets and dis[osable shite that i will never ever want to anything with other than line the recycling bin'

bet that'd go down well!

realistically ti should be simple: MW's should dole them out to women who don't go into hospital when they do the post birth visits. It's hardly a drain on them, they're going anyway.

BUT nothing wrong with PO having them either- anything encourages poeple into post offices to keep them open imo

I have never been offered a Bounty Pack apart from when I had dd1. I asked the registrar when we registered dd2 about claiming child benefit as I didn't realise/had forgotten that the paperwork is included in the Bounty Pack. The registrar put me straight.

IIRC when I had a bounty pack first time round there was a massive amount of paperwork/advertising within it...so I would imagine that in the haze that surrounds many of us after giving birth (!) some women lose the cb paperwork as it gets mixed up with all the other information.

I would of course have passed on any free samples etc I received (not applicable this time round) if anyone else could have made use of them. Perhaps the Bounty Packs have changed/improved since my recollections of them 4 years ago.

Pukka I have no problem ensuring that I claim my child benefit but I see no reason why they can't send a form out to mothers who birth at home, it can't be that difficult for them surely?

Thank you Peachy it's not just me that was a little overhwhelmed (!) with the contents of one of these packs.

My midwife brought my bounty pack following my homebirth.

Eh?

The JobCentre should have the forms.

Thats not to say they do though.

And I doubt it would be a huge hardship for the post office to stock one lot of extra forms

overwhelmed

StripeyMama - yes I think you may be right, that is what the Registrar suggested to us. However in the end I just phoned the number on the paperwork that we already had due to claiming it for dd1 and that worked out.

Bet the op didn't expect such an interesting discussion.

well, maybe it isnt 'that difficult' but it is an exttra thing for overwoked nhs, midwives to have to do, remember etc.
i think it is more important that they focus on the medical side of things, and the paperwork side of it be left to theparents to organise. msot health professionals are drowing in paperwork as it is.
i dont think putting ofrms in th epost office is ever a good idea. but in this, i know i am in the minority.

Good bounty packs
What a pile of cack .. does anyone actually read any of the dross in there
I yoinked the sudocrem and binned it.

And it has such a crap website

Perhaps Pukka you don't live in a small Welsh place where access to a job centre / any other office depends on a car or bus journey? places like this depend on the post office in a huge way

I used to do home visits with homestart and I really don't think keeping 3 forms in my bag with everything else would have made any difference at all.

Sudocrem and the washing tablet things

Why would you think forms in the post office is a bad idea?

i realise that i am probly the minority in this sherby.
but
wehenver i need something that has to be got from the psot office, they invariably either dont have it, or i get the wrong form, andhave to go back a gazillion time,s of get only one, then make a mistake and have to go back again, etc etc etc.
much much simpler to just download off the net.