MA 1st Payment

[allthingssparkly]

Anyone that's claimed MA recently, did you get your first payment before you got your decision letter in the post?

The strikes with RM are obviously causing postal delays. My MA is due to start from the 18th December, they have said anything owed will be backdated but I'm just wondering if anyone recently has been though the motions of this similar situ.

I am not much help here as I am confused with mine. I applied for it at end of Sept and wrote the dates in I planned to go on maternity. I was then sent a form back saying how much I will get but it also told me to fill dates in again (not sure why) I am not sure what to put as last day of work because I am currently using holidays to take me to 22nd Dec and then I want MA to start from 22nd.

I don't want to send form away just yet because I'm not sure exactly what to put and in case the baby comes before then but the strikes are a bit annoying because they will be happening again right after the 22nd ☹.

did you have to fill out a 2nd form to confirm dates ?

hello @chardaboo if I was you I'd send the form back and put the last date your working as the 22nd december if that is the case for you.

the strikes really aren't helping matters and that form could take a while to reach them because of this, I sent the initial form and all documents 1st class signed for instead of in the freepost envelope they provide and it still took a week to reach them.

basically your maternity allowance will start once you've told them the date your finishing work.

I haven't had the other form issued yet and probably won't becuase I put the date im finishing on my inital form, so I cant see why they would send it, having already got all the details. The only thing i am waiting on is the decision letter, my claim is still "in progress" as they only received it on the 5th decemeber, my payments would be due to start from the 18th dec. I can't see a decision letter arriving for a while with the strikes and Christmas post. The last time I received any post was the 6th Dec its crazy!

@allthingssparkly Yeah i think I might just go ahead and do that then ! it's weird because I put all the dates on my original form so don't understand why they sent a second out to me.

I was the same I sent mine sent for when I first sent it, think it was similar and took a week and that was back when there was no strikes.

That's ages you haven't received any mail ! aaargh what a stress - I hope you get it back asap. I'm still waiting on a hospital letter from round about that time as well - glad they emailed it to me as well or I wouldn't know about it !

it's a nightmare when it's things like this you need the mail for.

@chardaboo It's a nightmare 😩 I will have to call them next week to find out what's happening and when I'm going to get my first payment.

I hope you get sorted, I suppose you could call them and give the details of dates over the phone that way it may speed up the process of your claim and payments starting otherwise you could be waiting a while 😬