Why do my benefits change monthly?

Help_So_confused

I get Child tax credits and working tax credits as well as housing and council tax help.

I am self employed and earn about £135 a week. I have 3 children 2,16 and 19 all in full time non advanced education.

I can't understand why my benefits change each month, when I ring them to check all the children are still being included they say they are, but this month the money received only just covers the rent and my credit card payment. Not my bills or food and sadly I didn't realise that I had been paid so little and don't have enough money for my rent next month.

I run my details through benefit calculators and I have never paid anywhere near what they come out as.

I really don't know what to do, why do they do this?

I'm sorry if the answer is already out there, I'm not good at finding things on forums

Caz3121

As self employed, means tested benefits such as housing benefit will fluctuate as your income does (I am assuming this is on the back of you giving them regular updates on your income)
If you are in private rented, how does your actual rent compare to the LHA rate
You may want to look at doing a SOA of income and outgoings. Benefits are not for paying debts and your benefits will decrease when your eldest turns 20/leaves non-advanced education so best to be prepared
Do you receive maintenance as this will not affect your benefits

Help_So_confused

Hi thank you for replying.

To be honest, the money did not even cover rent + council tax and gas/ele let alone the credit card, water, food, child care costs, etc, I just thought it would be easier to say rent and credit card rather than going into more detail.

I am getting about £80 a week under the Housing max allowance.

I don't get maintenance as their father passed away with no provisions.

Being s/e they are only working on my estimated yearly earnings that I gave them beforehand when I started my claim, so the next update they will get is when I post my tax returns in Jan. Not a month by month basis.

I'm so worried I can't sleep and can't ring them until Monday to try to figure out what is going on. They did send a letter a while ago to say it was going down, but I didn't really understand the 10 page document, so rang them and I put it down to them taking the eldest off, so I made sure he should still be on there. I thought it had all been sorted out.

Housing_Benefit_Officer

Self employed income is used for 52 weeks in the calculation of your benefit entitlement. Normally you last years self employed figures are used to calculate the coming years benefit.

Fluctuations are normally caused my multiple changes to Tax Credits where HMRC can notify the local authority of 3 or 4 or more changes to the weekly Tax Credit awards especially after a review.

Look at your notifications and see what income figures have changed.