thinking of taking redundancy, what benefits can i get

jennmark

hello,
i'm currently 14 weeks pregnant with my second child. the offer of redundancy has come up at my workplace, my redundancy payoff would clear all the debts (other than the mortgage) that my husband and i have. i am thinking about taking the redundancy and becoming a stay at home mum. my older child will start school in september when this one is due to arrive, originally i was just going to take the 12 months maternity and then go back to work but this looks like it could be an opportunity to really change our lives for the better.
the issue is that we cant live off my husbands salary alone, we currently recieve ctc basic rate but that stops this month if i remain in work. his before tax salary is 22,880 if he works no overtime, though there is often overtime available at the moment (dont like to include that in my calcs though). i really need to know what ctc we would be entitled to plus any other benefits we could get though i dont think we'd get anything else other than cb.
also, i know that is i was made redundant i could get ma instead of smp, but i'm also a self employed avon rep, so if i continued my business after my redundancy would i be unable to claim the ma?
i've looked at the ctc website but the calculator only works for this tax year, the deadline for submitting my redundancy request is today (eek! only really discovered it could be viable at end of last week) and final decisions will be made by the end of the month, so i cant wait till the new calculator appears on the website to work out if we can afford it.
any help would be hugely appreciated,
thanks,

Jen

p.s, we will have none of the redundancy money left, it will all be used paying off the debts.

DaisyFlower

Your husband earns too much for WTC so you would just get CTC and the usual child benefit. There arent any other benefits that replace your wage if you choose to be unemployed as there is already an income in the household.

If you cant live on your husbands salary, then taking redundancy is going to be a gamble as you cant guarantee to walk into another job when your maternity ends.

Tax credits will cease soon, its never wise to plan to leave work on the basis of what the state will pay as it can be pulled or changed at any time.

BigAunty

What are these debts? Are they credit card debts or loans that you aim to pay back early?

scat

If you can clear your debts and live off his wage then do it. If you can't then don't even think about it. You won't get any help with him earning that kind of money and before too long you'll be accumulating the debts again just to maintain your current standard of living. Jobs are really precious at the moment.
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DannyboyMidlands

If you can't live off your husbands salary alone then I can't see how you can even consider taking redundancy. Unless the payout is enormous, much more than maternity pay and you'll get another job quickly when you need to.

Even if current benefits would alow you to get by, its hardly a secure way to plan for the future.

jfh7gwa

I cannot believe what I'm reading. Your solution to being in debt and unable to live off your husband's salary is to take redundancy to pay it all off and claim benefits to fill the salary gap that would exist?

It's short-sighted at best - the government is cutting BACK on the level of financial support being handed out, if you can't live on your husband's salary the answer is to do like the rest of us - go out and earn what you need to fill the gap. The idea of "give up work, claim benefits instead" is exactly what's wrong with this country, and hardly serving as a role model for your children.

Being a SAHM is a choice that not everyone gets to have.

On a more constructive note, if you can't live on his salary, you could instead look at alternative models than the obvious one:

- shift work, to avoid childcare costs (my mum and dad did this for 5 or 6 years when we were young, actually it worked out quite well apart from the days my dad was in charge of tea - bad cooking!)
- could your husband become the primary carer? If you have higher earning potential than his 22k a year, he can look after bubs whilst you earn the bread
- "share working" - DH and I went 3 days a week each for a couple of years and this worked the best of many worlds, it was really a nice balance - unfortunately due to him moving employer (sector) it meant we're both back to fulltime now, due to house move, but i do think getting two 60% wages worked very well if you're lucky enough to get your employer to think about it
- re-training perhaps? maybe childcare related or something with a higher salary than you or your DH currently have?

Put it this way, relying on benefits to top up the fact that you can't pay your bills on his salary is a waste of time even thinking about for your family's long-term financial well-being.

karenx

To be able to get MA you need to of worked at least 26 weeks in the test period before your due date. So you may not get this. Also if you do and receive MA you cannot do any work so you wont be able to do avon. If you get a small earnings certificate for avon if you leave your job its only about £27 per week you get in MA
Is it really wise to use your payout to pay off your debts then being unable to manage on 1 wage? Surly you should use the payout to help live off?
And once baby is here you will only get a little more child tax credits and child benefit and thats it. So you mjay find its even harder to get another job
I would stick to keeping your job

jennmark

ok some further clarification, i am not thinking, 'lets give up work and claim benefits instead', i am investigating if it would be possible for us to get by without my wage and wondered if anyone knew what benefits we would be entitled to with two children and a household income of around £23000 before tax.
the debts are loans and a credit card, they were accumulated by my husband a while back, and we have been steadily paying them off for the last three years, however this is a much quicker way to clear the debt and save some of the interest. alowing for only child benefit (no ctc) for 2 children we are around £50 short a month, i was hoping that ctc might make up the shortfall, i appreciate that sitting around doing nothing and relying on benefits is not an appropriate lifestyle choice, it is also not the choice i was thinking of making. i dont intend to stay home long term, i do intend to look for a new job when my children are in nursery and school, i do consider that i might retrain. my full time earning potential is similar to my husbands, the job i currently have is good, i would not be able to get the wages i get for the hours i work in a new job, but i'm not looking for a new job just yet and would be willing to take a lower paid job when the time comes to make ends meet. i have also discovered that i would still be entitled to my smp which i would get in a lump sum and would be a savings cushion for hard times.
my husband already works shifts but it isnt worth me giving up my job to take a lower paid shift job to avoid childcare bills, we wouldnt be any better off financially and we would never see each other.
if we cant pay off the debts then we cant afford for our houshold income to drop much below what we currently bring in so both of us going part time is not an option.
there is a very real possibility that within the next 6 months this decision is taken out of my hands anyway, we are shedding 25% of our workforce, as a middle manager working part time about to go on maternity leave, i dont see my job being one of the ones at the top of the list for protecting at all costs.
i know we are not entitled to any other benefits, i was just hoping someone might know what we would be entitled to in terms of ctc.

Tankrizzo_2

It would be very unwise to make such a move wholly reliant on state assistance to keep on an even keel. You do not know what the future may hold for welfare payments. What would you do, for example, if next year the qualifying criteria for your desired state assistance was changed and you no longer qualified? Also, if it comes down to 50 quid a month which makes the difference, what happens if your car breaks down? Or your boiler explodes? Or your child needs expensive care for some reason?

The intelligent thing to do would be to stay in your current employment. People are being laid off left, right and centre at the moment - a job is a valuable thing in this climate.

BigAunty

To the OP, you don't need to defend yourself against the judgemental posts - they are against forum etiquette and rules and should not have been posted. Just ignore them or report them.

You can model the impact of future changes to your impact on benefits by putting in different scenarios into the Turn2us online benefit calculator.

What is the likely redundancy package?

What you need to be aware of, in terms of paying off your some of your debts, is that the DWP may judge that you've done this intentionally to put yourself in a better position to claim means tested benefits. As I can't currently see that you are entitled to any means tested benefits, this shouldn't be an issue.

But just to make you aware, the DWP can take a dim view of people paying off loans early when there is no legal requirement to do so so this won't apply to all your debts. There is an expectation that people stick to their repayment plans rather than get rid of a lump sum by prematurely paying down debts and then applying for means tested benefits. It's about intentionally, a deliberate practice by the benefit claimant, I know this doesn't apply to you.

In the meantime, download the MSE budget planner and work through the site to identify where to make savings. See the Direct Gov website about debt management and visit the Debt Free wannabe board here and the bods there (more sympathetic than this benefit board) will stop you from drowning in debt).

mildred1978

Post up an SOA. I'd bet £50 a month of savings could be found in minutes.