Universal Credit self employment work hour requirement increased to 35 hours

Jim1984

Hi, In recent months UC pushed up my minimum work hours from 30 to 35. I'm a single parent with a six year old. I'm self employed and this change has pushed my minimum income floor up to £1400+.

When it happened I thought it would be doable to earn but it's a struggle. The main issue is finding 35 hours a week to work. Once I drop my child off at school and return home it's 9:30am as it's a long walk back as the school is some distance (I don't drive and no buses). I work straight through until 2:30pm when I go to pick up. Getting much work done after school is tough. So pretty much 25 hours of work are possible over five weekdays. On weekends I barely get any time to work. 

I genuinely struggle to find 35 hours a week to do work when I'm alone to knuckle down. The 30 hours requirement was doable but now I'm up to 35 hour requirement and it's tough with the increased minimum floor jumping up. Can I ask them to put work requirement hours back down to 30 hours? I'm worried even asking will get me put under a microscope and losing everything. I can prove I don't have a car and the distance of school from home and thus how many hours I have to work in a day. Many thanks.

Spoonie_Turtle

Jim1984 said:

Hi, In recent months UC pushed up my minimum work hours from 30 to 35. I'm a single parent with a six year old. I'm self employed and this change has pushed my minimum income floor up to £1400+.

When it happened I thought it would be doable to earn but it's a struggle. The main issue is finding 35 hours a week to work. Once I drop my child off at school and return home it's 9:30am as it's a long walk back as the school is some distance (I don't drive and no buses). I work straight through until 2:30pm when I go to pick up. Getting much work done after school is tough. So pretty much 25 hours of work are possible over five weekdays. On weekends I barely get any time to work. 

I genuinely struggle to find 35 hours a week to do work when I'm alone to knuckle down. The 30 hours requirement was doable but now I'm up to 35 hour requirement and it's tough with the increased minimum floor jumping up. Can I ask them to put work requirement hours back down to 30 hours? I'm worried even asking will get me put under a microscope and losing everything. I can prove I don't have a car and the distance of school from home and thus how many hours I have to work in a day. Many thanks.

The MIF is based on earnings not whether you can actually work for the specific set number of hours in a week.  Are your earnings directly correlated to how many hours you can work?  (Many self-employed people have to work for more than the hours the MIF is based on, in reality, to earn the requisite amount.)

Obviously I don't know anything about your situation beyond what you've said here but your work coach will probably assume you can work for an hour or so after your child has gone to bed on most days, maybe some mornings and then grab a couple of hours on a weekend day while your child occupies themselves.

Is there no school bus provision?  Or any parent you know well enough and trust who can take your child to school or bring them back?

itsthelittlethings

Does your work coach have any discretion on this? 

Or they may be thinking you should be looking for a higher paying job where you can keep the hours steady but earn more?

itsthelittlethings

Sorry - just seen you are self employed. Is there any scope for rates to go up?

marcia_

 Can't you work in the evening or weekends? 

itsthelittlethings

I’m sure they have discretion.

huckster

Where you are the prime parent carer of a child that lives with you, for a child aged between 3 and 12 years of age, the MIF is based on 30 hours and not 35 hours.

A Work Coach does have discretion to reduce the MIF to below 30 hours to take into consideration any barriers to work.

Sounds like you need to request a self employment review appointment at the Job Centre to discuss this.

sheramber

£1400+ is 30 hours at minimum wage of £12.21

The minimum wage increased in April which may be why your MIF has increased.