Help regarding Job Seekers Allowance

atomicsheep

If you give up your job then you are highly likely looking at a sanction on the benefit.
If you get sacked it depends on the reason behind being finished for a sanction to apply.
The jobcentre shouldn't (and i dont think they do this very often) tell people they cant claim. They generally tell the customer to phone the contact centre for a new claim and start the claim process to find out. Alot of the time the JC advise it may not be possible.

If she calls the Contact centre and tells them she's doing 7 hours and she's looking for work, i'd bet my wallet (only flak in there at the moment!) that they will tell her she has potential entitlement to JSA then book an appointment at the JC to get the claim rolling. She then may get full advice on a Jobseekers agreement and what she will have to do to meet the criteria

dizzydusty

It is very very unlikely that the jobcentre would tell someone they cant claim as that would leave them open to a claim of misdirection should the customer then find out the advice was wrong. I would always give advice and tell someone to claim anyway so they had it officially and in writing.

The issue with the course of study is that if she states she is not willing to give it up (I appreciate she may have paid money etc, but the long and short of it is, she is unemployed, with no way of financing herself) then this unwillingness would affect her availability and actively seeking work. There are rules regarding what can be considered when people wish to restrict the hours/days/type of work they are looking for and unfortunately not being prepared to give up a course of study in order to seek full time employment is not a reasonable excuse.

Like someone else stated, as long as she states that she is willig and prepared to give up her course of study in order to take a full time job then this should suffice, as long as her job seeking activity shows she is applying for full time work. However the duration of the course may also cause issues. If its classed as full time she may have no other option but to give it up. Again there are rules regarding full time study courses, but an advisor at the jobcentre will be more up to date than I.

imataloss

Thank you everyone for your replies. I will suggest that she calls the contact centre again and makes another appointment at JCP.
Then she can make a claim and see what happens from there.

bunny999

Higher education students are not usually entitled to benefits unless they have dependent children.

Oldernotwiser

bunny999 wrote: »

Higher education students are not usually entitled to benefits unless they have dependent children.

That only applies to students on full time courses. That's why I suggested that the OP makes certain that this is a part time course as the small number of hours don't guarantee it.

bestpud

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

If you've given your job up for no good reason I certainly don't think you should get JSA.

However people can be sacked for all sorts of reasons. They don't need to have done anything wrong.

As for redundancy, well I believe you can get Contribution based JSA (assuming you've paid enough NI) for six months, then it is means-tested on your family income/savings, so if you've had a big redundancy pay-off or your partner works, you won't get any.

But as for sacking? I believe it should depend on why you were sacked.

It does.

There are sanctions but they are not automatic and they will look into the reasons behind the sacking if the claimant tells them it was unfair, or whatever.

I believe the length of a sanction is discretionary as well but don't quote me on that one!

atomicsheep

i think the sanctions are up to 6 months but are discretionary as mentioned above

atomicsheep

...............

Nigella_2

It is what the course is listed as. It is not just the amount of class room hours that count. Jobcentreplus would look at your learning agreement etc.

An Adjudication Officer would look into the reasons why your last job ended and decide it you claim would be affected. There may be an option for hardship.

It is up to you if you put in a claim, nobody can stop you but can advise you.

Short-n-Sweet

Its a sad situation really. It seems the JS will only really help those with no intention of getting work. I think its unfair she cannot claim JSA considering she is looking for work and surely because she is studying they will see she isnt lazy and willing to better herself.