Hi

I have had jsa stopped for not attending an employment programme , but never received a letter for appointment , i realized after the sanction was applied that i had a letter in someone else's name , my address but wrong postcode ,its a wonder the letter was delivered at all.

The letter was for an appointment for employment programme , the same date i was supposed to have not attended.

I put in my appeal stating what had happend and included a copy of the incorrectly named and addressed letter.

My payments were stopped from mid-april.

In mid-june when i was at jobcentre to sign i was informed that 3 more sanctions were placed on my file (3 of which are 6 month sanctions) and needed appealing to, i asked if i can write 1 and apply to all sanctions with copy's as all would be repeats of my 1st responce , she insisted they all had to be hand written , so i done it and i'm still waiting .

I've had my responce to say they have received my appeals but thats it.

I didnt apply for hardship as i could borrow money from family , thinking the mistake would be rectified quickly , the hardship claim has been in just under 2 weeks but cant backdate it , still no responce from jsa , its not far off 3 months non payment cause of a admin error.

I really dont know what to do , i visited jobcentre to ask how much longer , but was just given a shrug of shoulders and told they;ll get round to it.

Any advise would be great

you shouldn't have borrowed money from nobody,borrowed means having to be paid back,also this will affect other entitlements.you've done yourself no favors,only served their purposes.

its another case of just not wanting to pay,disrupting payments and as i was once told by one of these people "the system can mess you around".thanks for telling me.letters do appear to be being sent out late for appointments.

gather all the evidence.the tribunal is independent of them,they are not keen on tribunals and will review the so called new evidence before the proceedings start.it would be worth getting outside help to help matters along such as the cab.its important to keep signing during this stage too.you might want to write a letter to caxton house with all this.keep proof of everything.

you shouldn't have borrowed money from nobody,borrowed means having to be paid back,also this will affect other entitlements.you've done yourself no favors,only served their purposes.

 

its another case of just not wanting to pay,disrupting payments and as i was once told by one of these people "the system can mess you around".thanks for telling me.letters do appear to be being sent out late for appointments.

 

gather all the evidence.the tribunal is independent of them,they are not keen on tribunals and will review the so called new evidence before the proceedings start.it would be worth getting outside help to help matters along such as the cab.its important to keep signing during this stage too.you might want to write a letter to caxton house with all this.keep proof of everything.

Every time I come on this forum I discover more ways the **** are trying to trick claiments into losing their benefit.

No wonder the unemployment figures are coming down, everyone is moving onto Hardship payments.

Isn't it illegal to open a letter with someone else's name on it? That should be an easy win.

Isn't it illegal to open a letter with someone else's name on it? That should be an easy win.

It's only illegal to tamper with mail in transit.

Once it arrives at its destination address then you can open away with impunity.

There's the Postal Services Act 2000 which says "A person commits an offence if, intending to act to a person’s detriment and without reasonable excuse, he opens a postal packet which he knows or reasonably suspects has been incorrectly delivered to him." Although in your case I can't see how that would be enforced, unless your reasons for opening someone else's mail was to act dishonestly.

Totally ridiculous. How on earth can you be expected to attend when you have received no notification? They may argue that they sent notification however you have evidence which will allow you to answer that although a notification was sent to your address, it was addressed to another individual thus you could not be reasonably expected to know that the letter was meant for you. I'm assuming there are no other identifiers on the letter which would suggest it was for you, and which would have prompted you to make further enquiries - such as your national insurance number, or other information specific only to you. Thought that is little excuse it may be used for their argument.

Unfortunately there is no time limit set in law for a reconsideration or appeal to be dealt with. The decision will first be reconsidered by DWP and if their decision is unfavourable, it will go to the Tribunal Service.

What I suggest you do in addition to the appeal, is submit a complaint stating that you are seeking redress to put you back into the financial position you would have been in had their maladministration not occurred - see the link I've posted below. You have been able to borrow money - the word 'borrow' implies that it has to be repaid therefore you are not in any better a position, that's common sense.

Financial redress for injustice resulting from maladministration

What are the other sanctions for?

What I would have advised is a letter asking for a reconsideration of the decision and would have enclosed a cop of the letter you received with all o te incorrect information on it. The sanctions have been imposed due to non attendance of the employment programmes but you were not aware of your need to attend. Did they not try to call you?

A reconsideration usually takes a maximum of 4 weeks (majority of cases I have dealings with is approx 2 weeks maximum but we are about to hit peak leave so that will it will increase slightly) where as a straight reqest for an appeal takes months.

Hardship decisions should also be dealt with within 1 week with the next payment falling into your normal payment cycle following the decision (again I can only base this on what happens in the office where I work).

You can still request a reconsideration of the original decisions and really would recommend this in the first instance.

The sanctions have been imposed one after the other due to non attendance at the employment programme, I will be honest and put my hands up, the new regime with work prgramme and work choice is going to run very similar to the programme you will need to attend in order to have the sanctions lifted anyone as until you start attending tey will continue to refer you to the DMA team, I am sure we will soon see an increase in similar threads.

i was told after failing my appeal the tribunal would take 14 weeks to sit for exactly the same situation.

it sounds like your being fobbed off with excuses' and given the runaround,this doesn't sound right.i would take the advice erikapnp has given and put some pressure on these people.

The bad news is that jobcentreplus are a law unto themselves, and now have targets to sanction as many people as possible. A friend of mine is 52, has worked 30 years and paid her taxes, is now finding it hard to get a job but is being bullied by jobcentre staff in their 20s who have no real idea of the job market or any genuine aim to find her work, they just want her off the list one way or another.

There must be a backlash, soon ... maybe if David Cameron gets dumped.

Another friend suggested that it would be a better idea to pay everyone in the country an allowance, say 60 quid a week, and do away with all the jobcentre staff, fraud investigators etc. Natural ambition would ensure that most people strove hard to achieve more than their 60 quid, and those who earned a lot could pay taxes etc. It is radical but it would probably work better than this current culture when some people are paid just to make other people feel terrible about being unemployed. What does it really achieve, other than making good, decent people feel ill and demoralised? You can't magic jobs out of nowhere.