JSA, HB, CTB questions

Cate1976

This is going to be long but thought it best to put everything in one thread.

Situation is we're moving to Norfolk on 11th september. My husband's DLA wasn't renewed so he's claiming JSA couple rate with me being excused from looking for work due to having children under 5. I will be looking for work though with the idea that if we both end up with jobs, child care will be mixture of approved which'll be covered by child care element of CTC/WTC and my parents might have the girls 1 day a week.

The problem is we've been told that in England JSA can take 6 weeks to fully process and even though my husband will be looking for work and signing on, it could be 6 weeks before we actually get paid. This is going to mean paying rent, council tax, bills and food out of Child Tax Credits and Child benefit. I've seen a post on here that if money isn't in bank account 3 days after the first signing that phoning for Crisis Loan shows that payment is due and forces JSA to be processed and paid. In reality, how likely is this to work? What are we entitled to while waiting for benefit to be processed? I seem to remember reading somewhere that as we have children under 5 that we can't be left without enough money for food and if gas/electric meters are pre pays money to put on them.

Housing Benefit: My Mum asked how long this takes to process and where we're moving to it's 6-8 weeks and the council don't pay interim payments so we're expected to pay the full rent for 2 months. My parents are guarantors so if it comes to it, they'll pay the rent and we'll pay them back when HB gets paid. I've worked out that we'll be paying £6.?? a week ourselves (can't remember the pence offhand). The maximum that we'll get is £115.38 week and rent is £525 pcm. Thing is that I'm concerned that HB will count loans from my parents as capital/income. The way I've thought of getting round this is that we let the standing order go out of our account. For day to day things such as food, nappies and money for meters if pre pays, Mum gives us cash. I have to make it clear that we're not trying to fiddle the system in any way.

Council Tax Benefit: I understand from posts here that we have to pay the whole lot while waiting for it to be processed and CTB won't be processed till HB is processed. First question is how long is CTB likely to take to be processed? Next question is once it is processed, will any money that we've paid over what we should be refunded to us or will it have to be credited to out CT account at the council? Last question is when we get the first bill which'll be for the rest of this tax year, will council allow us to pay the council tax every fortnight on the day that JSA goes into our account or do they have set days that it has to be paid?

With the JSA being paid every fortnight, we're using that to pay the bills that go out monthly (will be moving the dates to end of month) and the CTC will pay food and other day to day expenses including gas/electric if they're prepays. Child Benefit will be used to pay for things which'll benefit the girls (most of it saved for clothes, birthday & Christmas presents).

Girl's birthday is 1st December, am I being optimistic in thinking that most if not all benefits will be sorted by then if neither my husband or I have a job? Would like to be able to use November's child benefit to get their birthday presents and December's to get Christmas presents.

If anyone can answer any of these questions and provide links to relevant rules if any of what we've been told is inaccurate, it would be appreciated.

CIS

Next question is once it is processed, will any money that we've paid over what we should be refunded to us or will it have to be credited to out CT account at the council?

If your account is put in to credit then any monies you have paid can be refunded.

Last question is when we get the first bill which'll be for the rest of this tax year, will council allow us to pay the council tax every fortnight on the day that JSA goes into our account or do they have set days that it has to be paid?

This would be dependent on the local authority.

Cate1976

Thanks CIS, first answer is what I was hoping for although there is a part of me that thinks it could be sensible to leave it with council to help us out if one of us gets a job and it's a while before first wage gets paid, it'll stop us going into arrears.

Second answer is helpful as well, will ask when we get the bill.