JSA and intermittent work through agency - help please

mandragora_2

Hi there - I'm hoping someone will be able to help. My relative left uni last summer and has struggled to get work since. He eventually signed on, and was about to claim his first payment of JSA when an agency he'd signed up with found him a factory job. At first this was regular, every week, all week, but around November it dried up and since then it's been intermittent, with a couple of full weeks here and there, but mostly either a day or two here and there or, just as often, two or three weeks in a row with nothing. I can see he'd get JSA if he regularly worked 16hrs or less, but he sometimes works more than this, often less. In the dim past when I 'signed on' all I remember doing was answering the question 'Have you worked this week?' with either a yes or a no, and them telling them which days I'd found work for, and my benefits were adjusted acordingly. At the moment, my relative doesn't think he can claim anything, due to his 'stop-start' work pattern. Does anyone know if this is right, or is there a way he should be able to claim for those days/weeks when he actually has no income? If so, how should he go about it, please?

Any ideas/advice at all would be gratefully received. He worked so hard for his degree, and it's horrible to see how disheartened he is getting.

happy35

I think he should sign off when he starts work and expects to work more than 16 hours and make a new claim the day after he last worked

Kimitatsu

He needs to go down to the job centre and make a claim. Just as in the past, he can put the claim in and then have it adjusted if he works and earns more that week - this is a means tested benefit after all. If he works less than 16 hours a week then his JSA is reduced by the amount he earns over £5 a week.

If he has a contract which is promised to last for a set period of time then he needs to sign off, but if he needs to sign on again within 6 months then he can make a rapid reclaim on the original claim that he made.

Victoriajayne

As the agency are not providing a regular pattern of work, he needs to sign back on for JSA, then sign off when he gets work in excess of 15 hours 59 minutes in a benefit week, then do a rapid reclaim when the work is over.

Regarding benefit weeks, if for example his signing day is Monday, his benefit week runs from Tuesday to Monday. He could be offered 3 days work at 7.5 hours a day on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, but still be able to remain signed on as he would have done 7.5 hours in one benefit week, and 15 hours in the next.

Throughout last summer, I was doing casual security work at festivals for different companies while jobseeking. If I'd been offered work on a Saturday and Sunday that came to 16 hours or more, I would sign off on a Friday, then do a rapid reclaim on a Monday.
If the work was less than 16 hours, I'd stay signed on, and fill out a B7 form at the jobcentre detailing the days and hours worked in the previous fortnight, and when payment was due for the work. Then I'd have to fill in another B7 form when I actually received the pay, at which point they would amend my benefits to suit. You must remember to fill in the second B7 and provide the applicable payslip, otherwise the benefits delivery centre suspend your benefits until they get the information. It helps if you remind the job centre adviser to note on screen that they have received and forwarded the paperwork, then the benefits delivery centre know that its actually on its way !!!

It does tend to make a right mess of your benefit claim though, and takes a few days longer to sort out every time you make a rapid reclaim ... just need to be patient with them at the jobcentre !!!

Mine got into a mess because one company paid monthly, and the months payslip included pay for work when I had been signed on and also signed off, at different rates of pay - I had to provide proof of what the payslip actually covered and make sure the job centre was aware when I had been signed off.

When you are working less than 16 hours/week and stay signed on, they disregard the first £5/£10 of the weekly earnings depending on your circumstances, then deduct the rest penny for penny from any benefits that are due for that week. But as they can't amend your benefits until you've actually received the money, it ends up getting done a couple of weeks later - I had a constant stream of letters with new calculations !

Anything that you have earned for hours done when you're signed off is disregarded for benefit calculations.

So it may be beneficial to sign off anyway if you're expecting perhaps 24 hours work but end up only doing 15.5 ... ;-)

Feel free to PM me if you need more help :-)

Hammyman

Victoriajayne is 100% correct as this is what I had to do from Jan-March for several years due to hit and miss agency work.

mandragora_2

Thanks so much for this guys - I really appreciate your help. I will show this to him today, so that he's sorted from now on.

Thanet62

Just found myself in the same boat and to be honest the whole process is extremely frustrating. I was working for the Royal Mail over Christmas and have been retained on a casual basis I have mostly worked 1 day a week and have been told it might pick up closer to Easter. Last week I worked 2 nights and declared these hours on my B7 when I signed on this afternoon. I was told to sign off, handed a JSA4 (reclaim form) to complete all 16 pages to get benefit again. I am frustrated because a) my details are already in the system b) my JSA is now affected.
I'm not cheating the system but how can I ever know what will be in my account from one week to the next? This will have to be the norm everytime my hours are in excess of 15.59mins!!! It just seems an exercise in jumping through hoops for the sake of it without any common sense.

Hammyman

Thanet62 wrote: »

I'm not cheating the system but how can I ever know what will be in my account from one week to the next? This will have to be the norm everytime my hours are in excess of 15.59mins!!! It just seems an exercise in jumping through hoops for the sake of it without any common sense.

I did several years as an agency lorry driver. After the second year, the lessons were learned and I banked as much as I could from March to September and in November to December to cover the other times when work was sporadic.

Thanet62

Thanks it seems alot of people are in the same boat nowadays with so many jobs being on the old wait at the "dock gates" principle.
It would be better if the processes were made more efficient and streamlined to avoid gaps/reclaim worries.
Hopefully work will pick up as promised and yes I'm looking for other work to fill the gaps (got census work). At least I'm doing something eh!

cassieB57

Thanet62 wrote: »

Thanks it seems alot of people are in the same boat nowadays with so many jobs being on the old wait at the "dock gates" principle.
It would be better if the processes were made more efficient and streamlined to avoid gaps/reclaim worries.
Hopefully work will pick up as promised and yes I'm looking for other work to fill the gaps (got census work). At least I'm doing something eh!

They are.

The 'remunerative work rule' refers to working 'on average' 16 hours a week or more. (In practice, nobody works 15 hrs 59 mins) If your hours of work fluctuate, JCP will first find out if there is a 'pattern' for example over 2 weeks you might work 10 hours one week and 20 hours the next, so rather than sign on/sign off evry week, an average (10 + 20 / 2 = 15 hrs per week) If there is no discernable pattern, then an average is taken over 5 weeks. (this period can include weeks when no work was done) This ensures that someone with regular work but fluctuating hours doesnt have to sign of and on again every time they go over 16 hours

Thanet62

Thanks Cassie I think I read a similar post here a while ago regarding averaging out the hours. When I challenged this yesterday when I signed on I was told it was not the case and I had to sign off as I had worked the 16 hours the previous week handed a reclaim form and basically shown the door. Can anyone tell me if this is written down? As I want to take this further.