When can an 18 year old sign on?

Caryne

My stepson has just finished his A-levels (yesterday) and wants to know when he can 'sign on'. He was 18 in January. Can he do it now or does he have to wait until the end of the school year?

pilky

He can do it now, however, if he has finished studying in the last 3 months he will need to provide dwp with a letter from his education provider stating what date he officially left his course.

MrsManda

You will also need to inform the DWP/HMRC as your entitlement Child Benefit and Child Tax Credits will end as soon he is claiming benefits in his own right.
- if he's not claiming benefits in his own right then your CB and CTC will continue until the 31st August.

Caryne

pilky wrote: »

He can do it now, however, if he has finished studying in the last 3 months he will need to provide dwp with a letter from his education provider stating what date he officially left his course.

This is where he (and me) gets confused. His last A-level was yesterday but obviously, though he doesn't have to go into school anymore, technically the course isn't finished, until the end of the academic year in July so I guess the school won't produce anything yet to say the course is finished.

pilky

This has got me thinking. There is now over 1 million 18-24 year olds unemployed and that is not to mention all the poor children leaving school with no hope of getting employment. Do the DWP expect education providers to write an abundance of letters for each individual child trying to claim JSA - madness!

Oldernotwiser

pilky wrote: »

This has got me thinking. There is now over 1 million 18-24 year olds unemployed and that is not to mention all the poor children leaving school with no hope of getting employment. Do the DWP expect education providers to write an abundance of letters for each individual child trying to claim JSA - madness!

There won't be that many 18 year olds claiming JSA; most will be staying in education or will have jobs.

Caryne

Oldernotwiser wrote: »

There won't be that many 18 year olds claiming JSA; most will be staying in education or will have jobs.

How do you work that out? My son, along with many of his friends, have now left school at 18 with no prospect of a job and unless they risk huge debt by going to Uni (which he has decided not to do) will have no option but to claim benefit until a job can be found. Why do you think many, many others will not be in the same position?

maginot

It will be at the end of the school year before he can sign on. As he is still registered as a student until this time, not when his last exam finishes.

dugdale_2

This question keeps coming up so perhaps should be made a "sticky"

Someone who has left school will not be able to claim Jobseekers Allowance until their child benefit stops being paid as it is not possible to claim both benefits at the same time.

Child benefit for someone who has just completed A levels continues to be paid until the end of August of the year in which the A levels were taken.

Although it is possible to ask for the Child Benefit payments to cease at any time JSA will not be paid until the beginning of September.

Caryne

Thank you for clearing this up. I had tried to search here (and the DWP site) but with no luck. Thank you very much for the clarification as, as you can see, even on here a variety of different (and contradictory) answers were being given. I will now convey this information to my stepson.

I would like to mention that I did know both JSA and Child Benefit could not be paid at the same time but I wasn't 100% sure if you could stop the CB and then claim JSA.

thorsoak

Why not encourage him to sign on at an employment agency for the summer, rather than claim JSA?