change in the JSA claim process ?

justpaper

been told by a mate he had to call a number too start a new claim on the jsa,..they took his details and will ring him the following day at a set time,. seems like they changed it all too a call centre ? cant find this on there site,. is he pulling my leg dont think he is tho he was saying that ppl at the call centre dont know what there on about 1 person told him one thing another told him some thing else,.

peter999

It's called a shambles.

They're introducing this across the country, then going back to old system
when new one descends into chaos.
.

Edimew

It's true. When I claimed a few months ago I went down to the office. They gave me a number to call to arrange an appointment. I asked if I they could arrange an appointment, seeing as I was there, but no I had to go home and ring the call centre.

He's also correct in saying that the people in the call centre aren't on the ball. I had to explain to the person I spoke to what contributions based JSA was, she'd never heard of it.

justpaper

lol thats great,. how could this be saving resource,. mind u they did sack alot of the job centre staff a few months back,.

hjb123

This is what happened when I started my claim for Incapacity Benefit last year. I rang the helpline and they took some details then said someone would ring back within the next couple of days. For whatever reason I wasnt in when they rang as I had left it a couple of days. I then received a letter in the post saying that they hadnt been able to speak to me and I had to ring the number printed on the letter within a certain amount of time otherwise my claim would be disregarded. Anyhow after I eventually spoke to them I then had to have an appointment at my local jobcentre to go through all the details again!

It was also the same process I had to go through when I claimed for the reduced rate of Income Support during my Incapacity appeal

applecharlotte

I've just started working in a contact centre taking claims for jsa, ib, is etc.

And yes, that's how it's done. Instead of sending the claim form out, an appt is made to call you back and go through the form, and for the operator to fill it in for you.

Since working here though, i have learned patience when speaking to anybody in any type of call centre. The questions may seem irrelevant, but they have to be asked to everybody.

So please, for my sake and others, don't have a go at us....we're just doing our jobs, reading from a script a lot of the time. And we don't make the decisions, we just do our best to be friendly and efficient. The amount of abuse we get is unbelievable.

Sorry to get off the point. Just wanted to plead for understanding.

singlehouseholder

Welcome to JobcentrePlus.....
I used to work in a jc+ contact centre until they shut us down, even though we were top performers in the country, and centralised everything-poo bad.
From what I can gather laws are having to be changed because of the contact centre regime, something about "an intention to making a claim?" Eg, you tried to call cc since last week, therefore you made the intention of contacting them, you should be entitled to claim from that date, CIS, Ted, you know anything about it? I know decision makers are going mad about the whole process. Also forms can be downloaded from net? I don't think Jobcentres can refuse to give you a claimform, for whatever, just say you have been unable to get through blah blah blah, everyone is entitled to make a claim and no one can stop you from doing so!!

peter999

singlehouseholder wrote:

From what I can gather laws are having to be changed because of the contact centre regime, something about "an intention to making a claim?" Eg, you tried to call cc since last week, therefore you made the intention of contacting them, you should be entitled to claim from that date, CIS, Ted, you know anything about it? I know decision makers are going mad about the whole process. Also forms can be downloaded from net?

-Claim starts from when you first call & they either send claim form (old system)
or arrange future callback to process claim over phone (new system).

-You can always call the Call Centre using phones in Job Centre (!!!),
if there's a problem & you can't call from home.

You would think it simpler to maintain option to hand out claim form if you are
in Job Centre anyway, but obviously not.

Although I think there have been lot of staff cuts recently.
A lot of people seem to have disappeared in my Job Centre.
.

Fran

Certain areas of the country will be familiar with this way of making a claim as the "One" pilot scheme started about 4 or 5 years ago and people have been making claims by phone since then in those 8 or 9 (?) areas.
The claim is taken from the first contact with the Jobcentre Plus. As mentioned you will get an appointment to fill in the form by phone, they will then send a copy to you which you sign. Check it carefully as they don't always put down what you have said!

Having said that, I've just found this which implies the "One" pilot scheme was not very successful in getting people into employment which was part of its aim. I assume it is an altered version of the scheme that they have taken on. The pilot scheme cost £80million!!! :eek: There's also a bit more on the Policy Studies Institute website.

peter999

Fran wrote:

Certain areas of the country will be familiar with this way of making a claim as the "One" pilot scheme started about 4 or 5 years ago and people have been making claims by phone since then in those 8 or 9 (?) areas.

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200203/cmselect/cmpubacc/170/17005.htm
Avoiding gold plating
7. The risk of a project being gold plated needed careful consideration, particularly with projects which piloted new approaches which might be then rolled out nationally. There was a risk that the best resources were allocated to a pilot to ensure that it was successful and then subsequently it was not possible to replicate such a concentration of effort across the country.

My experience of Jobcentre Plus is that it is pretty poor.
My Job Centre seems to have lost a lot of staff in last few months.

I can imagine the government hiring expensive consultants to survey new Jobcentre schemes
(One project etc.) & getting the answers they want to hear.
.

justpaper

thanks for the replys some interesting stuff,. as for my mate he had his 42min long! phone call today on his moblie (hopefully the gov/ is using Voip to keep the costs down)

applecharlotte im sorry too hear about the abuse u and ur co-works get,. i think this is down too the system being crap,. and the lady my mate talked today said some silly questions (it went some thing like below)

Lady do you have a private pension?

Mate no

Lady will you be getting payment from your private pension in the next 4 years

confused Mate no

remember this went on for 42 mins same questions asked over again, just in a different way,. and he did get !!!!ed off,. i would say the lady didnt know what she was doing

anyways i dont know what was wrong with the old way,. they might even move these call centres to india,. i wonder how much a N.I number is worth over there lol