New Job Start Date Deferred

Bambam

My son was offered a job (confirmed in a letter) with a start date of 16 April and subsequently handed his notice in to his employer and left on Thursday 5 April. He took a weeks holiday before he started his new job. On Thursday 12 April he received a call and a letter from his new employer to say the start date had been put back until 23 April. Today he has received another call and a letter apologising that they have had to defer the start date until 6 May (genuine reason for deferring.) He has no other income.

My son is of the opinion there is nothing he can do about it and will be unable to 'sign on.' He has been very fortunate in that he has never had to claim job seekers allowance before. I on the other hand, think he should be able to 'sign on' as he is effectively unemployed.

Any advice would be very much appreciated.

Cherry_Bomb

No he couldn't sign on because he wouldn't be actively looking for work would he.

Even if he did lie and sign on it would take longer than a couple of weeks to sort his JSA money out so he'd be no better off than he is now.

macalacka

He is not job seeking, he has a job and a start date. He can get some temp work with an agency in the meantime. Unfortunately your son is right, nothing much he can do and best not to make too much of a fuss in case he is seen to be "difficult". Good luck for his new job though!

Evilm

He will be able to sign on. He will however be expected to look for other roles, although potentially they will allow you to look for short term only rules but it depends what they put in the agreement in the first meeting with them.

He will have to go through all the procedures as if he doesn't have a job lined up at all.

an9i77

I don't see why he couldn't sign on. He would need to be willing to do any short term roles before his job started, but if he is, then he is a 'job seeker' and therefore entitled to JSA.

Bambam

Thanks guys. It just seems unfair that he did everything he should do correctly and he is now without an income at present through no fault of his own. I'll be really hacked off if the job falls through, especially as he was in full-time, permanent employment before all this.