Universal Credit Beware!

boroben

Morning,

Unfortunately, I do not think much can be done to help my situation, however I post this in the hope it may prevent others falling into the same trap. I am self employed within the hospitality industry and was forced to stop work in late March having no other income I panicked a little and followed the advice been put around at the time to claim Universal Credit.

Having submitted the initial claim I quickly became aware that I was not going to be eligible as my wife has some capital from an inheritance, so I withdrew the claim.

I now find that as a result of initiating a Universal Credit claim my Working Tax credits have been stopped and will not be reinstated.

So at a time when the Government is making nice noises about helping people through this difficult time they have in my case succeeded in making a dire situation even worse

poppy12345

 Universal Credit is a means tested benefit so yes savings/capital of more than £16,000 exclude you from claiming. I'm assuming you didn't use a benefit calculator before you claimed. If you had then it would have told you that you weren't entitled.

There's also no warning before you submit the claim that your tax credits will stop if you claim. A lot of people have made a claim for UC and not realised this.

huckster

You can complain to your local MP and ask them to intervene on your behalf.  Ask them to raise a question with ministers about this situation and whether due to the current crisis, they can provide a way to remove the UC claim and reinstate the tax credits claim.
Not harm in asking. The more people who raise this with MP's, the more chance they will be able to get the Government to enable mistakes by claimants to be rectified.

Jeremy535897

boroben said:

Morning,

Unfortunately, I do not think much can be done to help my situation, however I post this in the hope it may prevent others falling into the same trap. I am self employed within the hospitality industry and was forced to stop work in late March having no other income I panicked a little and followed the advice been put around at the time to claim Universal Credit.

Having submitted the initial claim I quickly became aware that I was not going to be eligible as my wife has some capital from an inheritance, so I withdrew the claim.

I now find that as a result of initiating a Universal Credit claim my Working Tax credits have been stopped and will not be reinstated.

So at a time when the Government is making nice noises about helping people through this difficult time they have in my case succeeded in making a dire situation even worse

I fear it won't. This issue has already been mentioned hundreds of times on this forum.

calcotti

huckster said:

You can complain to your local MP and ask them to intervene on your behalf.  Ask them to raise a question with ministers about this situation and whether due to the current crisis, they can provide a way to remove the UC claim and reinstate the tax credits claim.
Not harm in asking. The more people who raise this with MP's, the more chance they will be able to get the Government to enable mistakes by claimants to be rectified.

I think a lot of people have been affected by this and the lack of warning on the UC claim page is, in my opinion, reprehensible. I agree with huckster that if enough people contact their MPS about it it is just possible that a way will be found to put people who have not been entitled to UC back onto Tax Credits - although in all honesty I don't hold out much hope of that happening.

boroben

 Morning

Thank you to everyone for taking the time to respond, you are correct Poppy12345 foolishly I did not use the benefit calculator before claiming.

I will write follow the suggestions and write to my MP (who as it happens is also the Chancellor of the Exchequer) although like others I do not hold out much hope.

Just one other point I have read that a universal credit claim can be reversed if initial claim was made as a result of following incorrect official advice, I just wondered would all the media announcements by the government advising self employed people to claim universal credit not constitute official advice.

poppy12345

All you can do is try but i agree with others, don't hold out your hopes.