JSA after redundancy - few "newbie" questions.

highguyuk

I am currently on my notice period to leave work on the grounds of redundancy, and are due to leave work Mid/Late July after years in full time employment straight from education. I will leave with no debts and a healthy rainy day fund in the bank. I live at home with my single mother in a housing association property, she works part time with an income of circa £8k. Previously, my income was high enough that she was not entitled to receive any benefits, but this may change due to my redundancy. I am listed as a joint tenant of the property.

I plan to sign on straight away, I have no shame in signing on. But from this point on my knowledge rapidly decreases, this “world” is not something I know about. Should I be contacting benefits now with a date that I am due to leave, or do I ring when I have actually finished work? I am presuming I will be claiming Contributory JSA for the first 6 months, and that my savings will not count towards the payment for the first 6 months. Do I still have to declare my savings though? After 6 months, I will move onto income based and I believe my savings will have an impact of the amount of money I will be able to claim (I have between 6k and 16k).

JSA means signing on every 2 weeks, what happens if I unable to make the signing on meeting? My 1 concern is a holiday that I had booked previously, which is Europe for 1 week only Fri-Fri. If my signing on meeting clashes with this, what happens? Can you have special dispensation for the 1 week, did I see you can have 2 weeks holiday per year and it is not like I booked whilst I knew I was going to be unemployed.

What happens with housing benefit being a joint tenant? Is my housing benefit paid on half of the property? Are other taxes such as Council Tax included too? I am presuming that my mother will be able to claim extra benefits now too, although these could obviously be removed at any time pending any new job scenario.

I am just a bit lost now with lots of questions, any advice etc would be a great help in just getting ready for being unemployed and what we are able to claim.

karenx

You would be best to wait untill claiming. Yes you will go on contributions based for 6 months then your savings is taken into account. Going on what you have said you will not be entitled after that. You do need to declare any savings when you first fill out the forms. That way come 6 months time they can check you havnt spent or gotten rid of say 10k in savings to carry on claiming JSA.
You can take a holiday yes, you will have to sign off before you go then do a rapid reclaim. And you wont be paid for the period you are away as you wont of been activly seeking employment or be available for it.
Your mum can tell the relevent departments about your new situation and see if it will make a difference to anything.

newlywed

I tried to ring to start my JSA claim whilst on redundancy notice. They got a bit huffy and said it would be easier to just ring the day after my employment ends. When I said I'd rather get the claim started, all they did was send me a form to fill out in advance and tell me to ring back to make an appointment for the job center after my employment ended. So it's easier to just wait.

When you do ring up for an appointment at the JC, they expect you to be almost instantly available to have an appointment in the next 48 hours and if you're not available, they dock your JSA money for the first day or two unless you take the first appointment they offer.

Any housing benefit claim and the JSA claim for after your 6 months contributions based, will also take into account your OH's wages. That means after the 6 months, if your OH earns more than the £100 or so a week that you would get on JSA, you don't actually get any benefit money (though you can still sign on to get the additional training/courses/job seekers advice etc, that I've been told only kick in AFTER you've been unemployed 6 months). You just have to sign on but not get any money.

You have a booklet to fill out to show what you are doing to look for other work, eg checking websites each day, applying for so many jobs per week etc. I do actually find it useful to keep a record of exactly what jobs I've applied for (as when you get to large numbers of job applications, you do forget).

I've just passed my 3 months since redundancy and now have to sign on every week for 6 weeks. The job center is not a fun place to be at all, but many of the staff have previously been unemployed so are quite sympathetic

If you get fed up of all the time off and all the job applications, you are allowed to do unpaid voluntary work (as long as it isn't for friends and family).

Hope you find another job sooner, rather than later.

Wee_Willy_Harris

karenx wrote: »

You can take a holiday yes, you will have to sign off before you go then do a rapid reclaim. And you wont be paid for the period you are away as you wont of been activly seeking employment or be available for it.

If the holiday is in the UK, you won't have to sign off as long as you give an assurance that you still looking for work (internet) and prepared to cut the holiday short for job interviews. Overseas is different, but they can be flexible and might apply same rules if you give the same assurance.

gordikin

If the holiday is in the UK you can arrange to 'sign on' at the nearest JC+ to where you are staying.

viktory

Wee_Willy_Harris wrote: »

If the holiday is in the UK, you won't have to sign off as long as you give an assurance that you still looking for work (internet) and prepared to cut the holiday short for job interviews. Overseas is different, but they can be flexible and might apply same rules if you give the same assurance.

The OP has already stated that the holiday is in Europe.

highguyuk

Wee_Willy_Harris wrote: »

If the holiday is in the UK, you won't have to sign off as long as you give an assurance that you still looking for work (internet) and prepared to cut the holiday short for job interviews. Overseas is different, but they can be flexible and might apply same rules if you give the same assurance.

So basically, I can but try with the holiday. Surely there is the side though that if I have to sign on every 2 weeks and my appointments fall so that I can go I would “get away with it” so to speak. Or do you sign on every week, I’m getting the impression it’s every 2 but I could be wrong!

When I sign on, obviously I’ll need a wealth of information – what sort of things will I need. For example, my bank accounts are all online I don’t have paper statements or my savings are online too with no paper statements. Or do they just run a check on my NI number and can find out what information they require?

Newlywed, you suggest I would be getting £100 a week. Isn’t that £100 ish every 2 weeks? Thank you for your kind words, I am hoping to find new employment swiftly but have taken the decision (at the moment anyway) that I will wait a preferred job rather than take something and be miserable in a job. I’ve spent many years working and working hard with qualifications on the side – I’d like the time to do a few things I want to do such a voluntary work or little projects etc.

gordikin

It's roughly £120-£130 ish /fortnight. I never had to produce bank statements as I was on contribution based Jobseekers allowance (for 6 months) and after that I got nothing as I was honest about having more than the ?£16,000 in savings cut off and therefore didn't have a valid claim.

Wee_Willy_Harris

highguyuk wrote: »

So basically, I can but try with the holiday. Surely there is the side though that if I have to sign on every 2 weeks and my appointments fall so that I can go I would “get away with it” so to speak. Or do you sign on every week, I’m getting the impression it’s every 2 but I could be wrong!

Yup, you sign every 2 weeks. Obviously, you SHOULD tell them about your holiday even if it falls between 2 signing days. And you SHOULD keep to the speed limit, and wear a safety belt, and drink responsibly, and have 5 portions of fruit and veg a day...... But the DWP staff are very busy so I'll leave it up to you as to whether you would want to place this extra burdon upon them.

newlywed

You sign on every two weeks UNTIL you have been unemployed 3 months, then you sign on every week for 6 weeks. So depends how far down the line your holiday is

Yes sorry CB JSA is £65 a week or £130 a fortnight.
It's about £100 a week if both of you are unemployed and have to do a joint claim.


Just a point, you don't get to pick your sign on day as it's set by the first letters of your national insurance number. However they did give me a choice of AM or PM.

viktory

highguyuk wrote: »

I am hoping to find new employment swiftly but have taken the decision (at the moment anyway) that I will wait a preferred job rather than take something and be miserable in a job.

That 'choice' may not be yours to take. You are expected to actively seek employment and although there is some leeway as to what/where and how much it pays in the early days, the longer you sign for the tighter the margins become. You will also be sent on compulsory training courses etc.

Appreciate that you have worked and paid taxes etc, for some time but that does not give you the right to kick back and chill out on JSA for as long as you fancy. I also think that things are going to get a bit tougher under the new Government.

highguyuk wrote: »

I’d like the time to do a few things I want to do such a voluntary work or little projects etc.

We would all like to do that - but you should not expect the tax payer to support you while you carry out your little projects. Getting back into work should be your top project.