Work programme and JSA agreement

Lizj

Can anyone help me with this? On behalf of my adult son who has learning difficulties and autism, so he doesn't really know what questions to ask.
He has been on JSA for a year and on Work Programme for about 3 months. His JSA agreement, which was drawn up by a DEA, is to apply for 3 jobs a week. He usually does this, although with his disabilities it is not always easy to find 3 suitable vacancies. He is literate, semi-numerate and has dyspraxia.
Today his Work Programme provider (Ingeus) have told him that his job-seeking is "not good enough" and he is "not trying hard enough", so he must apply for 10 jobs every week or face sanctions.
Are they allowed to do this? Does going on Work Programme cancel out his JS agreement? And if not, what can we do about it?

brightonman123

best callthe JSA helpline, or see CAB..?

mynameistallulah

The WP provider can give additional instructions to the claimant. However they cannot sanction their claim, they have to send the information back to the JCP and they decide if a sanction should be applied.

marybelle01

Lizj wrote: »

Can anyone help me with this? On behalf of my adult son who has learning difficulties and autism, so he doesn't really know what questions to ask.
He has been on JSA for a year and on Work Programme for about 3 months. His JSA agreement, which was drawn up by a DEA, is to apply for 3 jobs a week. He usually does this, although with his disabilities it is not always easy to find 3 suitable vacancies. He is literate, semi-numerate and has dyspraxia.
Today his Work Programme provider (Ingeus) have told him that his job-seeking is "not good enough" and he is "not trying hard enough", so he must apply for 10 jobs every week or face sanctions.
Are they allowed to do this? Does going on Work Programme cancel out his JS agreement? And if not, what can we do about it?

This is going to sound utterly stupid, but bear with me. He is trying too hard. He is applying for three suitable vacancies. That's his problem. So apply for seven UNSUITABLE one's! That's ten applications. Sometimes with bureaucracy, it's easier to go with the flow than fight it. You and he both know that a whole load of employers, quite wrongly, won't consider him at all, suitable or not. So it shouldn't be an uphill task to apply to people who won't consider him. And besides which, you just never know. Maybe, just maybe, one of those employers actually may not be prejudiced and think that he isn't suitable for this job, but what about that other thing we have going … Stranger things have happened!

Elvisia

I agree with the poster above, can he just apply for ten jobs randomly online with easy applications? I used to apply for things that fitted their criteria, then I'd get down and apply for things I actually had a chance of getting and were in my field. The problem was I had 3 areas of jobs to go for, but if I applied for something I could do but it wasn't on the list they ummed and arred over it which used to drive me insane. Often the job titles were a bit different, for example one of my areas was 'researcher' but if I applied for something that was 'content producer' which was the same job they said I wasn't applying for the right thing and therefore breaking my JSA rules.

I ended up doing two lots of job searches, one was to please the JCP, the other to actually get a job I wanted. I really feel for your son having all his issues and being treated like this.

Horace

Alas the Work Programme has gotten hold of him - I was invited to my local jobcentre for a chat yesterday and we were told all about the Work Programme and it is something to be avoided as you cannot go back to the jobcentre (how true this is I am not sure but this is what I was told by the jobcentre yesterday). The providers of the Work Programme don't care about the individual all they care about is getting money from the government which they get regardless of how many people they help into work or not.

OP your son should register with Remploy as they offer help and support with job searches etc for people with a disability. I use them and have found them extremely helpful - I am getting interviews now which I never got before and I am looking at different jobs as Remploy have so many business partners. At least Remploy look at the person and not the disability.

I was advised by my jobcentre yesterday that if someone had a disability then it would be possible not to be put onto the Work Programme and it is down to the advisor in the jobcentre who pushed the button to submit them. What I understood about the Work Programme was that you could not claim JSA for 2 years once you were in their clutches.

Lizj

Horace wrote: »

Alas the Work Programme has gotten hold of him - I was invited to my local jobcentre for a chat yesterday and we were told all about the Work Programme and it is something to be avoided as you cannot go back to the jobcentre (how true this is I am not sure but this is what I was told by the jobcentre yesterday). The providers of the Work Programme don't care about the individual all they care about is getting money from the government which they get regardless of how many people they help into work or not.

OP your son should register with Remploy as they offer help and support with job searches etc for people with a disability. I use them and have found them extremely helpful - I am getting interviews now which I never got before and I am looking at different jobs as Remploy have so many business partners. At least Remploy look at the person and not the disability.

I was advised by my jobcentre yesterday that if someone had a disability then it would be possible not to be put onto the Work Programme and it is down to the advisor in the jobcentre who pushed the button to submit them. What I understood about the Work Programme was that you could not claim JSA for 2 years once you were in their clutches.

Thank you for this. He has already been referred to Mencap, not to Remploy, as the DEA thought Mencap were more attuned to his problems. The Mencap worker took him to one WP appointment then left him to get on with it by himself.
He attends a Mencap Job Club every week, where they just plonk him down at a computer to do job searches and applications.
I honestly do not see the point in him applying for 7 jobs he can not hope to get, it's a waste of his time and money and that of the employers. At the insistence of the WP advisor he has sent speculative applications to 36 local firms, from which he had 1 reply, which was a rejection.
Having failed at everything throughout his life, this constant rejection is soul-destroying for him and me.
I just want to know what his rights are. Because it seems that once you are on the Work Programme you don't have any. You are there to be punished for daring to not have a job.

fleesaurus

When I first started finding work, I was able to apply over 100 jobs online per every week on average (sometimes over 150 jobs per week), and in addition to that, hand in my cv to at least 5 companies. That's for unskilled work.

It's not difficult to 'apply' for jobs he should be able to do. 10 applications per week is not a lot. I find it when people do the bare minimal asked by the job centre or work programme, they are just there for the dole and not really making a real effort.

Disability is not an excuse to apply for just 3 jobs because the job centre asked him that. If they say 3, he should apply for at least 30! How long do you seriously think it'll take to find a job if he applies that little per week? I've heard people having to apply over 600 jobs before getting any interviews at all for entry level skilled jobs, and for unskilled jobs, it's not much better.

elaine12022

By law you have to take THREE STEPS per week towards finding work,not even apply for 3 jobs, so this can be eg looking on website, making a phonecall, seeing someone such as mencap. So to tell your son he has to make 10 applications a week is ridiculous!!

This is a new website offering free advice to people, they may take a couple of days to get back to you, but they gave me some good advice recently.

http://www.tnsradio.com/wellfairy.html

This says what Ingeus should be doing according to their own information http://www.ingeus.co.uk/pages/find_work/336/the_work_programme.html

Ingeus can provide you with the following support, depending on your personal requirements:

One-to-one support from an employment advisor
Advice on job-searching, CV writing and interview skills
Calculations that show how much better off you can be in work
Vacancies that are exclusive to Ingeus clients
Use of computers and phones to find and apply for jobs
Specialist advice on areas such as housing, debt and benefits
Health and wellbeing support provided by health specialists

this also has some information you might find helpful regarding issues of consent & protecting data http://www.consent.me.uk/

marybelle01

elaine12022 wrote: »

By law you have to take THREE STEPS per week towards finding work,not even apply for 3 jobs, so this can be eg looking on website, making a phonecall, seeing someone such as mencap. So to tell your son he has to make 10 applications a week is ridiculous!!

Utter tosh. There is no such law at all.

The conditions (not laws) governing claiming JSA require you to be actively seeking work, and in the end the JobCentre/DWP decide whether you are meeting that condition or not. But to suggest that somebody could meet the conditions by taking "three steps" that don't even include ever applying for a job is ridiculous!

TheMissus

To answer the OP's original question, no, the WP cannot alter your Jobseekers agreement. They can suggest that they change the requirements, they can lie and say they will sanction you if you do not agree, but they can't.

Lots more info at this forum - can't post links so google "unemployment movement" and check out their "Welfare To Work" forum. Lots of good information about your rights.