Urgent advice needed re JSA suspension

kittycatsam

Hi,

I need some advice on behalf of my Brother please.

He is 20 and been driven to the point of mental health issues due to problems with JSA. He has just smashed his flat up as well as several other things in the past few days and is clearly suffering from depression now as he is sleeping all day.

In September he was on JSA for a few weeks and then got a temping job for about 5 weeks. When the job ended he went back to sign on and they told him his JSA was suspended as he did not apply for a job (due to already finding one which he was waiting to start!!!) - this was applied the same day that he started work and he wasn't informed at the time.

He appealed after this decision and was knocked back.

He was told that he was entitled to no money at all for 6 months. We since found out he could get hardship payments. He has now made four applications for hardship payments and been turned down each time on the basis that there is a suspension on his account which another department needs to remove before the claim can progress. Each time the advisor has apparently asked this team to remove it yet the claim still gets declined. He has spent hours on the phone and at the benefits office having interviews. He has spoken to Supervisors and so has my Sister and they have been assured that the problem will be sorted but nothing has been done still.

He lives on his own, luckily he rents a flat from my Mum who has been understanding about the lack of several months rent. Otherwise I'm sure he would be homeless by now! He has had no money at all now for 3 months!!! He has token meters for gas and electric which me and my sister have been paying for and we have been giving him meals.

CAB were pretty useless and just said to go back to benefits office and tell them you are entitled to hardship payments which we already knew.

Please can somebody help with a way to proceed. He has lost all motivation and is hinting at suicide. He has been looking for jobs but there is a real lack of them available and this has further knocked him.

Thanks

tcr_3

If he's lost the appeal against the imposition of a sanction, well, that's that. The sanction stands. He then has to apply for hardship payments, which you say have been turned down 4 times in a row ... that I don't understand. Hardship exists for people who are sanctioned ... and it's easy enough for them to tweak his records and start making hardship payments. So I'm wondering if he's telling you it like it is.

When he's being interviewed for hardship, they ask things like "what will you do about food, powercards, rent if hardship isn't awarded ?" ... and if he's answering "oh, my sisters will pay all that for me" ... then that's grounds to refuse hardship payments anyway (because he's not in hardship if you guys are continually bailing him out, that's the brutal logic of it).

Dunno what more to suggest. Get your MP involved ?

Sounds like he's losing the plot now anyway & his mental health has deteriorated. Get him to the doctor, see what he says. If he's now medically unfit & the doctor will give him a medical note, then your Brother can apply for Employment & Support Allowance instead, which isn't affected by sanctions etc.

kittycatsam

He's definitely not keeping things from us. My sister went with him to one of the several hardship claim interviews. He said to them that he's in lots of debt as he's been borrowing to live, that he has now heating or power in his flat etc. There's just some sort of issue with the process which they seem incapable of resolving. If we can get him out of bed today we will take him to the community legal advice centre in the hope that they'll be more help than cab. I'm concerned that if he gets his hopes up and then fobbed off again he'll just blow up. I really could do with advice from anyone who works/ has worked in benefits and knows what the issue could be so that I can get the welfare advisor to specifically point out what they need to do.

tcr_3

I don't understand the grounds for refusal of hardship payments, tbh. As far as I know, hardship payments exist for those who have been sanctioned. This vague "suspension" explanation for refusal just doesn't sound right. And I don't understand why you're saying hardship's been refused, but that every time you contact the Job Centre they're saying that they're trying to sort it all out. Makes no sense at all

Hopefully a DWP person will swing by tonight, they might understand what's going on.

kittycatsam

Thanks. That's what's so frustrating! We don't understand it either. They're saying that he qualifies for hardship and that there shouldn't be any problems with his application. Next thing he gets a refusal letter. He queries this and they say it shouldn't have been refused, it's due to something vague that hasn't been removed from the system. They will request that this is sorted out but he has to reapply in the meantime. So, off he trots for another interview and the same thing happens again.

After the latest application he also got a subsequent letter saying he hadn't paid enough NI, the benefits advisor told him that even when the sanction was lifted he wouldn't get anything as a result. I was under the impression that he could move on to income based JSA. Whoever he either rings or speaks to in person just says that they don't deal with that but can't tell him who does.

To be honest I want to go to the local paper/ news channel but I'm not sure how he'd feel about that. If he didn't have support from his family he may well have topped himself by now (if he hadn't starved or frozen to death already) or be in prison for stealing to support himself. I'm frankly disgusted that someone can be left in this vulnerable and desperate position which I feel is through no fault of his own.

tcr_3

What a mess. I'm assuming he's claimed both JSA(C) and JSA(IB) ? Surely to goodness they would've told him he needed to apply for both ?

If it's a problem with their computer systems, quite common with JSA, then they can take his records off the computer and pay him clerically until such time as they fix the problem (just means everything's got to be handwritten like they did before computers came in, way back).

Know what, phone the benefit people & ask them for an explanation for what's gone wrong & why he hasn't been paid. Try to nail them, tell them he's been awarded hardship payments & find out what he needs to do to get that paid. He'll need to do the phoning but can give them permission for you to speak on his behalf. If you get no joy, ask them to book him into the Job Centre for an appointment to see their enquiry adviser. Try & get an early morning appointment, that'll give them the whole day to try & sort it out.

Other option is for him to apply for a crisis loan, if for no other reason than the crisis loan office will contact JSA to find out what their problem is. The crisis loan office can insist that JSA pay any benefit due, same day, rather than for them to go through the rigmarole of doing a crisis loan payment.

There's a nuclear option left, phone his MP's constituency office and explain what's happened. Tell them it's urgent & see if the MP's secretary can get in touch with their contact at the Benefit Delivery Centre asap & try to get something sorted.

kittycatsam

So, we've been to Community Legal Advice and were told that they will not do anything for him until he has written a letter of complaint to the benefits agency and received a reply.

He has previously applied for a crisis loan and was declined as he is in a sanction period. They told him to claim the hardship which he is entitled to...

We stopped at the benefits office on the way home and made an appointment for Wednesday morning. I nearly flipped my lid because the advisor said to him that his sanction is due to end this month so he may as well wait a couple more weeks!!! Then went on to say that on 10th December at one of the hardship application interviews he requested more information on a job, they matched him up with this job and put it on his file. This was a late afternoon appointment, when he got home he realised that the closing day was that day and he had missed the deadline. He told them on his next visit that this had happened and was told that this would be noted. Well, apparently it looks as though he is going to receive further sanctions on his claim now due to this!!! Just unbelievable! I just really hope that a job will come up for him soon.

Thanks very much tcr, we will see what happens on Wednesday and I now know about the manual paper claiming. Meanwhile I'll try and get in touch with our local MP to try out the other option.

frank_begbie

If that had been me, I would have sat in the Job centre and refused to move.
Make them get the police involved and cause a big fuss.

If they weren't giving him any money to live on, what did he have to lose?

He may as well been in jail where they would have to look after him.

Its truly shameful what's going on these days.

People are getting frightened to go to the Job centre in case they get into trouble.

dmg24

frank_begbie wrote: »

If that had been me, I would have sat in the Job centre and refused to move.
Make them get the police involved and cause a big fuss.

If they weren't giving him any money to live on, what did he have to lose?

He may as well been in jail where they would have to look after him.

Its truly shameful what's going on these days.

People are getting frightened to go to the Job centre in case they get into trouble.

You would rather end up with a conviction for a public order offence than try to sort out the problem by civil means? Maybe this attitude is why you are unemployed?

atrixblue.-MFR-.

frank_begbie wrote: »

If that had been me, I would have sat in the Job centre and refused to move.
Make them get the police involved and cause a big fuss.

If they weren't giving him any money to live on, what did he have to lose?

He may as well been in jail where they would have to look after him.

Its truly shameful what's going on these days.

People are getting frightened to go to the Job centre in case they get into trouble.

if you told the JCP staff your gunna sit there untill the sort it they will let you sit there for hours let it frustrate and anger you, then call the police if you kick off or before home time to remove you.

frank_begbie

dmg24 wrote: »

You would rather end up with a conviction for a public order offence than try to sort out the problem by civil means? Maybe this attitude is why you are unemployed?

But when nothing else has worked, what are you supposed to do?

They've been at it for months trying to sort it out with no result.

Talk is cheap when you're not in that kind of situation yourself.