Off on Sick. How do I cope?

funkyphantom

Hi,
I have been off work for a while with a mental Illness, all of which has been brought on from work. It all started last August, and to cut a long story short they paid me full pay, which we were very grateful of. I managed to get back to work in the February. Things went great and then my boss started to put more and more pressure on me meaning I went back into my depression and anxiety last week. I have recieved a letter today saying they will only be paying me statutory sick pay. We have 2 kids and its worrying me how we are financially going to cope on £89 per week.
Could someone please advise me on what we can do to cope?
Regards
Funky

Caz3121

funkyphantom wrote: »

We have 2 kids and its worrying me how we are financially going to cope on £89 per week.

You should put in claims for child benefit, child tax credits, housing benefit if you rent and council tax support
Could your partner work?
If you have debts, start talking to the lenders about your situation

funkyphantom

sorry, yes my partner works, but her incomings are less than our outgoings. Debt wise I have council tax, mortgage, gas, electric, mobile phone bills (3) etc etc

January2015

Your statutory sick pay will also run out soon. I think you get 28 weeks in a year. You will be able to apply for Employment Support Allowance (ESA) to replace the statutory sick pay (SSP). You can claim a couple of weeks in advance of your SSP ending so that there is no gap between SSP ending and ESA starting.

Write to creditors and inform them of the situation. If you can't afford to pay them - as long as you inform them they will be fine (seriously, we've been there and done that and they have been really helpul).

Make sure you claim all benefits. Visit the entitledto website and see what you could/should be claiming.

Takeaway_Addict

funkyphantom wrote: »

Hi,
I have been off work for a while with a mental Illness, all of which has been brought on from work. It all started last August, and to cut a long story short they paid me full pay, which we were very grateful of. I managed to get back to work in the February. Things went great and then my boss started to put more and more pressure on me meaning I went back into my depression and anxiety last week. I have recieved a letter today saying they will only be paying me statutory sick pay. We have 2 kids and its worrying me how we are financially going to cope on £89 per week.
Could someone please advise me on what we can do to cope?
Regards
Funky

Did you actually get help to solve the issues and if work is as you believe the cause have you looked to move to another job?

k3lvc

I've been in a similar position to you - I had 6 months on full pay on what I considered to be a work-related mental illness The promised reduction to SSP certainly focussed the mind for me and led to some fairly swift discussions on both sides including Occupational Health about returning to work in some capacity. I was lucky with the support given which I'm sure isn't representative across the board but I'm sure the damage done by being ill and in debt is far worse than 'just' being ill.

What options are there for work (either current or new employer) or is that out of the question ?

funkyphantom

Takeaway_Addict wrote: »

Did you actually get help to solve the issues and if work is as you believe the cause have you looked to move to another job?

I was hoping the issues were going to be sorted out when I went back in February, but my manager started to pile pressure on me as soon as I was passed medically fit by my doctor and he had that in writing. I'm currently waiting on a solicitors advise because I believe I have a case for constructive unfair dismissal. But that doesnt help me in the short - mid term.

funkyphantom

k3lvc wrote: »

I've been in a similar position to you - I had 6 months on full pay on what I considered to be a work-related mental illness The promised reduction to SSP certainly focussed the mind for me and led to some fairly swift discussions on both sides including Occupational Health about returning to work in some capacity. I was lucky with the support given which I'm sure isn't representative across the board but I'm sure the damage done by being ill and in debt is far worse than 'just' being ill.

What options are there for work (either current or new employer) or is that out of the question ?

I'm in a very niche job, and jobs like mine don't appear very often. I would have to look for something different I guess. We have no Occupational Health or anything like that.

phillw

funkyphantom wrote: »

sorry, yes my partner works, but her incomings are less than our outgoings. Debt wise I have council tax, mortgage, gas, electric, mobile phone bills (3) etc etc

I don't want to patronise you, but standard advice is to look on cheap energy club to see if you can get cheaper gas/electric & see if switching mobile phone providers can save you money. When you're working then doing things to save a few pounds here and there doesn't seem worth it. Now that you've got time and nothing to do, then it gives you something to do.

You can talk to the council tax people and tell them of your reduced income and they may be able to reduce your council tax payments, although they are often less understanding than they used to be as central government no longer covers the reductions.

Depending on the state of your mortgage then they may be able to give you a holiday, ironically if you don't talk to them before you go into arrears then they are unlikely to help you.


This is a way of dealing with daunting things that you might find useful. Write up a list of all the things that need dealing with.

Put dates on them for when they absolutely must be dealt with (which might be the payment due dates for things that you won't be able to pay), some things may not have a date at all and are just money saving nice to haves.

Assign a number to each for how stressful it's going to be deal with, this may not be the same as how hard it will be.

Write down how much it's worth to you to deal with it, this could be how much you'd save by switching/cancelling or how much the mortgage payment is etc.

To reduce your stress then start a smaller list which includes the most stressful one with the soonest date and a handful of the lest stressful with the highest value

Do a couple of the least stressful ones first to improve your self confidence. Then tackle a stressful one and then go back do doing some of the least stressful.

If you can't get something done in one go, then adjust the stress/value/date based on the conversation you had. But still tick it off the small list, once you've finished the small list then take a break and repeat.

If something new comes up then write it on the big list, but continue with the small list that you already started.

Sometimes you may find that a lot of things need to be dealt with soon that are very stressful & you don't have time to mix in less stressful things. I would tend to put all of the items that are due soon on a small list and pick the least stressful one and at least make a phone call and explain the situation, even if you don't have the time to actually deal with it there and then. Making an appointment to deal with it is enough to tick it off the small list. Go back to putting the highest value, less stressful ones on your small list as well once you've finished the must be done soon list.


Ticking things off lists is helpful, but large lists are daunting & items can take a long time before they can be ticked off. Some people split items on the big list down into dozens of parts so you can tick them off, but for me that just gives an even more daunting big list that you've spent time compiling that you could have been doing something about it. I've found the big list + small list helpful for work too.

sourcrates

How much debt do you have, you havent said yet ?

Do you own a house or rent ?

Any other assets ?

doingitanyway

phillw wrote: »

I don't want to patronise you, but standard advice is to look on cheap energy club to see if you can get cheaper gas/electric & see if switching mobile phone providers can save you money. When you're working then doing things to save a few pounds here and there doesn't seem worth it. Now that you've got time and nothing to do, then it gives you something to do.

You can talk to the council tax people and tell them of your reduced income and they may be able to reduce your council tax payments, although they are often less understanding than they used to be as central government no longer covers the reductions.

Depending on the state of your mortgage then they may be able to give you a holiday, ironically if you don't talk to them before you go into arrears then they are unlikely to help you.


This is a way of dealing with daunting things that you might find useful. Write up a list of all the things that need dealing with.

Put dates on them for when they absolutely must be dealt with (which might be the payment due dates for things that you won't be able to pay), some things may not have a date at all and are just money saving nice to haves.

Assign a number to each for how stressful it's going to be deal with, this may not be the same as how hard it will be.

Write down how much it's worth to you to deal with it, this could be how much you'd save by switching/cancelling or how much the mortgage payment is etc.

To reduce your stress then start a smaller list which includes the most stressful one with the soonest date and a handful of the lest stressful with the highest value

Do a couple of the least stressful ones first to improve your self confidence. Then tackle a stressful one and then go back do doing some of the least stressful.

If you can't get something done in one go, then adjust the stress/value/date based on the conversation you had. But still tick it off the small list, once you've finished the small list then take a break and repeat.

If something new comes up then write it on the big list, but continue with the small list that you already started.

Sometimes you may find that a lot of things need to be dealt with soon that are very stressful & you don't have time to mix in less stressful things. I would tend to put all of the items that are due soon on a small list and pick the least stressful one and at least make a phone call and explain the situation, even if you don't have the time to actually deal with it there and then. Making an appointment to deal with it is enough to tick it off the small list. Go back to putting the highest value, less stressful ones on your small list as well once you've finished the must be done soon list.


Ticking things off lists is helpful, but large lists are daunting & items can take a long time before they can be ticked off. Some people split items on the big list down into dozens of parts so you can tick them off, but for me that just gives an even more daunting big list that you've spent time compiling that you could have been doing something about it. I've found the big list + small list helpful for work too.

This is an excellent response. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by all I need to do as I am doing extra jobs to get rid of my debt. I shall bookmark this page and use your strategy. Thanks.