signing off and on to continue at college?

poor_country_girl

Hi MSE'ers!

I have a question to ask on my Daughters behalf...and any ideas or answers would help!

My Daughter is 20 years old. Over the past 12 months she has had to sign on for JSA several times after redundancy and several short term jobs.
In September she started a 1 year course at collage, it is part time so JSA have been able to continue paying her, she still has to keep looking for a job, and has to accept any full time positions offered - The former she has done, the latter has not yet happened!

She is doing amazingly well on her course and is fairly confident she will be able to find work in this chosen field once she is qualified next year - everything is looking fine!

Now the Job Centre is saying that she will have to leave the course in January as she has been in receipt of JSA for 6 months, and will have to go on a one week back to work course and go onto a government agency work scheme where she may or may not get any actual work. (she had signed up for an agency once before and on reading the contract realised they only have to offer you a few hours a year paid over 12 months in instalments!)

The only other option they have given her is to sign off JSA and continue funding herself.

Unfortunately as none of us are currently in employment, her Step father and I cannot afford to support her ourselves, even though we would love to be able to.

She has thought about signing off then back on again to start another 6 month cycle of benefits, but we can't see how this could be done without her being without income for up to 6 weeks while the claim is processed, and of course without her having a job for the time between signing off and on, will she even be entitled to JSA?

Has anyone had a similar experience? it seams a huge waste if she cannot get to the end of the course and get back onto the tax paying career ladder!

Any advice would be great.

Thanks

skintandscared_2

Has she looked into getting a part time job that could dovetail with the course, so she can earn and learn at the same time? It would be a shame to have to stop the course if she is enjoying it and doing so well. But can I ask - what IF she went for an interview, say next week, for a full-time job and was offered it. What would she do about the course then? And what currently happens if an interview is arranged during the same time as a lesson? If she gets a part time job and can stop the JSA, at least she will be left alone to finish the course.

poor_country_girl

Thanks - if she did get a full time job it would be a case of crossing that bridge etc, and to be honest in the past 3 months there have not been any full time jobs advertised she could do. She has applied for about 8 part time jobs per week with hardly any of the potential employers getting back to her, and she has turned up to 3 different interviews for bar and restaurant work when the person doing the interviews has not bothered to turn up - all very costly when we live in a small village that requires expensive public transport to get to the nearest towns.

She is going to ask at local places for part time work in her chosen field that can fit around her collage and this would be perfect, but she is a bit nervous!

Thanks!
Kath