This will be a long post so I apologise in advance. I decided to post in this section rather than AIBU as I can’t be doing with all the vultures and I thought I may get a more grown up response on here as I have seen first hand how some of these threads go down.
I have recently had a huge falling out with my sister and I don’t know how/if we’re going to survive it. Bit of a backstory-
We have never seen eye to eye, since we were kids really. We’ve tried to make an effort to get along for the sake of our mum as it makes her happy. I’m 32, married with no children, we both work full time in relatively well paid jobs and we plan to have children in the next couple of years. I have always worked full time since leaving college at 18 whereas my sister has bounced between working part time and being on benefits.
She currently works part time in a care home and her partner works full time for a conservatory installation company. They have 3 children together and rent a 3 bed house from the housing association. They have always had quite a rocky relationship and have been on and off over the years but things have been much better since the youngest was born two years ago. Now this is the issue:
She claims to be a single parent living alone with just the 3 kids. This is absolutely not the case as he has lived with them since the youngest was born. Because of her lies, she receives quite a fair bit in benefits that she is not entitled to, amounting to approx £1,200 a month along with her wages of around £600.
He earns around £1,300 after tax so they are bringing in at least 3k a month.
From the £1,200 she gets in benefits £400 is deducted to go towards her rent, she pays the other £200. She also receives a council tax reduction as she is supposedly “single”. Apart from that she doesn’t have many bills except car finance (both, he has a 4 year old BMW and she has a brand new Kia). They also obviously have to pay towards clothing and feeding the kids. They don’t have any child care costs as on the two days she is working my mum looks after the youngest child, other two are in school full time.
They’ve been able to get away with this as he listed his mum’s address as his current residence. Whenever he gives her money towards the bills and kids he pays in cash and he also parks his car a bit further down the road from the house incase any of the neighbours suspect anything. They also don’t talk about their situation to anyone except family, even her best friend doesn’t know the set up. They are very clever and know exactly how to con the system. We have spoken about the set up many times and I have been honest and expressed my disagreement with it. She’s always said she knows what she’s doing is wrong and that she worries in case she gets caught, but still continues to do it to this very day. I will add, she is not doing it to make ends meet either, It is purely down to greed and wanting to go on lovely holidays and have nice cars. She’s always said she wouldn’t be able to do any of those things if she didn’t fraudulently claim, which is simply not the truth. She would still be able to have those things, but she’d have to save up for them just like most people. I actually helped her a few months ago fill in a benefit calculator online to see how much she would be entitled to if she declared her partner living there and they were still eligible for help, albeit a lot less than what she is getting now (around £700 difference but still entitled to £500 a month) and she said this is why she won’t tell the truth. They would still be bringing in just over 2k a month and most of the rent would still be paid. She also has the option to work more hours, as my mum is retired and has said multiple times she would be happy to have the youngest more. My sister chooses not to accept this offer and just continues to work two days a week and fraudulently claim instead. She doesn’t realise how lucky she is, in regards to child care. Most people have to pay nursery and child minder fees whereas she gets it for free.
Things came to a head when we were at our mums house on Tuesday night. Sister told us she was planning on booking Disney land Florida next year for the oldest child’s birthday and again jokingly said she wouldn’t be able to do it if it wasn’t for benefits. At this point, I lost my patience and we really got into it, ending up in a screaming match in fact, I’m just glad the kids weren’t there to see it all. Again I was honest and said I thought it was disgusting and that she had no morals. I told her I would understand if she was doing it to make ends meet (I appreciate it still doesn’t make it right) but that just wasn’t the case. She was doing it to have luxuries.
She said that I don’t realise how lucky I am because we have a mortgage and that there stuck renting. Yes, I have a mortgage, simply because we saved up for years to buy a house and went without holidays and other luxuries for quite a few years. We had to compromise, which I’m sure is what most people have to do. Unless your a bloody billionaire, you can’t have everything right? This isn’t my sisters attitude at all, she wants everything and she’ll do whatever she can to have it. She said that most of the money she was getting she was putting towards a mortgage. I told her I didn’t agree with it and that the benefits system isn’t there to support her buying a house and going on nice holidays. Like everyone else she would need to compromise on things and maybe not have so many holidays or go to bloody Disney Land. She ended up storming out of the house and we haven’t spoken since.
I spoke to my mum yesterday and she said that I should apologise. I really don’t think I’ve done anything wrong, but been honest. She didn’t like what she heard but it’s only the truth. My husband supports me wholeheartedly as he’s never liked my sister anyway. I’m prepared to go on with the rest of my life not speaking to her, but it does make me sad that we‘re not close.
I don’t think she will stop claiming anytime soon as she knows none of us would ever report her. I really don’t agree with it and I’m not sure if I’ll be able to get past it. It makes it worse because she jokes about it and thinks it’s funny. When I spoke to my mum she said that it wasn’t my sisters fault as they make it so easy for her to fraudulently claim and that most people would do the same thing. Yes, I agree they do make it easy for people to fraudulently claim and they should monitor these people more. I’ve seen first hand that all it takes is for the partner to change his address and hey presto your definitely a single parent.
I understand the DWP just take these people at face value but just because it’s easy to do it doesn’t mean you should. I think my mum is torn and just wants to make us both happy.
As I said above, I know how most of these threads turn out, particularly the one this morning and I’m sure most people will ask how I know all of this information. She is my sister, she’s not just someone I have on Facebook and I have seen all the proof and had the endless chats. How do we move on from this?