On JSA but too ill to work?

Dunroamin

Have you arranged to pay back your student loan for this period?

scottishstudent91

Dunroamin wrote: »

Have you arranged to pay back your student loan for this period?

No, because I am not earning more than £16,000 a year. I don't have to start paying it back til then right?

Dunroamin

scottishstudent91 wrote: »

No, because I am not earning more than £16,000 a year. I don't have to start paying it back til then right?

I meant the part that covered you for the period after you left university. At present, if I've understood your posts, you've had both student funding and benefits for the same period, which isn't possible.

scottishstudent91

Oh right, sorry! and my loan has ended, my last payment received was either April or May (can't remember) and I only started claiming benefits on 16th May, is that ok?

cifpower

scottishstudent91 wrote: »

Oh right, sorry! and my loan has ended, my last payment received was either April or May (can't remember) and I only started claiming benefits on 16th May, is that ok?

You're only entitled to JSA when your course ends or when your loan covers you until

Dunroamin

scottishstudent91 wrote: »

Oh right, sorry! and my loan has ended, my last payment received was either April or May (can't remember) and I only started claiming benefits on 16th May, is that ok?

The loan you received at that point was intended to cover you for the rest of this academic year. If you've been overpaid you'll need to make arrangements to repay it, regardless of what you earn. If you're considered to still be a student then you'll have to repay your JSA and LHA.

As I said before, you can't have both!

scottishstudent91

Ok thank you. I'm going to jobseekers tomorrow so i'll speak to them. The academic year has ended though. Also, my doctor (who didn't know i was on JSA) gave me a line so that I could get benefits while being unable to work. So why would she do that if I wasn't entitled to them?

Thanks for your advice though and i'll speak to them tomorrow about it

BigAunty

scottishstudent91 wrote: »

... Also, my doctor (who didn't know i was on JSA) gave me a line so that I could get benefits while being unable to work. So why would she do that if I wasn't entitled to them?

...

Because there are more than 50 different types of benefits, and you can't expect a medical expert to know the benefit entitlements for each of their thousands of patients.

Also, GPs are busy and are used to many of their patients expecting/demanding sicklines (although I thought they were now known as 'fit notes') so may have been on auto sickline note mode.

In fact, one of the criticisms of GPs having a frontline role in determining who is too sick to work is that as general medical staff, they simply don't have the occupational therapy skills, nor the time, to determine what a person is capable of and the system demands that they write someone off from working for x period and leaves it to the DWP to determine if they are right or not.

Muttleythefrog

scottishstudent91 wrote: »

Ok thank you. I'm going to jobseekers tomorrow so i'll speak to them. The academic year has ended though. Also, my doctor (who didn't know i was on JSA) gave me a line so that I could get benefits while being unable to work. So why would she do that if I wasn't entitled to them?

Thanks for your advice though and i'll speak to them tomorrow about it

Just reading up... it is extremely unlikely your GP has spent effort understanding the benefits system and your personal financial circumstances in detail sufficient to determine the applicability of a medical certificate beyond it denoting you are currently unable to work.

scottishstudent91

Ok thanks for all the advice guys, just gonna suck it up and keep looking for a job. Don't really want to deal with all the hassle to get incapacity benefits or whatever it is right now.

I'll just keep looking. thanks for all the advice though