Working variable hours (as a TA) and housing benefit

[cakedup]

I am a single parent looking for a TA position but many of these are advertised through agencies and therefore on a daily paid rate. This means no pay during school holidays, sick days etc.

I am in a housing association flat and may still be eligible for housing benefit depending on my hours/pay. I spoke to housing benefit today and they said that I would need to calculate it regularly, perhaps on a monthly basis, sending housing benefit pay slips etc. so they can work it out.

What makes me nervous about this is that I will find it hard to calculate my incomings/outgoings (and therefore budget my earnings) if it is going to vary so much. Also, in my experience housing benefit can take weeks to process.

Does anyone have experience of this i.e. working variable hours and dealing with housing benefit?

A friend who was in the same position used to just hand in her payslip every month. Each month was obviously given a different amount of housing benefit but I think it was recalculated within a week or two each month. Has your l.a got a benefit calculator on their website? Might be worth checking what you would be entitled to based on say a months wage?

Thanks Danglyweed - I am just filling out the benefit calculator online form now. They calculate it weekly so I am calculating it based on a full weeks work.

What I don't understand is, what happens when it's a half term? I assume I will be entitled to full housing benefit. I assume I won't be considered unemployed even though I will have no earnings. I guess then I would just have to work out all my earnings for the whole school year in order to work out my incomings/outgoings.

I used to have to do this....I just took my payslip in every month. They photocopied it, gave original back then calculated HB themselves.

I've gone through the benefit calculator and for some reason I am entitled to child tax credits rather than working tax credits (based on what I would be earning as a TA). More confused than ever