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privatehudson

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Everything posted by privatehudson

  1. Well if he's not looking for work and/or not intending to start work for another 6 weeks then the best time to start claiming from would be in 6 weeks. He can however do an advanced claim if he knows what date he wants to claim from. So yes, he started a claim too soon. First he'd need to cancel the appointment and claim on the system, then he could ring 080000556688 and ask them for an advanced claim. They should book an appointment for the first working day from when he wants to claim and send out a claim form to him. This form will be essentially the same as the one he completed over the phone. He could alternatively just wait until that period finishes and then ring as normal. As far as I know he won't be penalised for cancelling the interview or the claim. He would of course loose out on any payments of benefit and being assigned national insurance credits for that period though. I don't think it would prevent him claiming Housing or Council Tax Benefit but don't have much experience with those. One thing you will want to check from some more experienced members though is whether spending a relatively large sum prior to making a claim might have an affect on the claim. I know that certain amounts of savings can affect benefits like Income Based Jobseekers Allowance. What I don't know is whether him spending money on a holiday/house re-decoration immediately prior to the claim might be considered what they call deprivation of capital.
  2. Hmm. The first contact system is designed to take new claims, not deal with general enquires. The very first question is "Are you calling today to claim benefit". Advisors can give general information but not advice, that is usually provided via the government's website. If he made it clear that he didn't want to claim at that point he should have been directed to different routes. If the customer wants to go through an eligibility check to see what they might be able to get it goes through a series of questions culminating in a statement, namely: "from the information you have given you may be eligible for [benefit]". Immediately after this there are two important questions. Do you wish to continue with your claim? What benefit do you wish to claim? A short while later there's a question about whether the customer wants to claim from the day they are doing the call (or an earlier date if they are resuming a case). Assuming the system was followed correctly your father would have been given plenty of opportunity to avoid putting in a new claim on that day. He also should have been asked about whether he was able to work now, and looking for work, which if he'd said no to both would not have made him eligible for JSA in the first place. This all assumes the process was followed to the letter however, and without listening to the call its hard to say whether this was done. Calls are recorded however, so it would not be difficult for the department to check if a dispute arose. Any claim can be cancelled at any point, including after an interview has been booked. If that's what your father wants to do ring 08456043719 and ask for the appointment to be cancelled and the claim withdrawn. If he's not seeking employment for the better part of a month it would be better to put the claim in after then anyway. As for the Kitchen job you mentioned as I said the calls are recorded, so as long a he mentioned at the time that he did not want to apply for the position that should provide good mitigation for not accepting the job. If he did not mention it at the time it could be a lot harder.
  3. Hmm. Its rare that anyone is sent an appointment confirmation letter these days as no standard letter exists to do so any more. I would keep the letter however since if he wants to make a case for backdating the claim it will be evidence to show that he had been in contact beforehand. On that subject as far as I know Northern Monk is right, the jobcentre staff do not have the right to tell anyone that they cannot backdate a claim, that's the role of a decision maker who usually works at a Benefit Delivery Centre. Even if the JC staff feel the reasons for backdating are spurious they are not supposed to override the request as that is not within their job role. I would ask for them to provide him with the relevant form (JSA5) so that he can put in the request. Now about the cancelled/rebooked/missing appointment (WFI). If he went through the whole claim with an advisor over the phone the system used to record his answers will also record an initial date of contact (IDOC) which should correspond to the date he started the process. Even if he had to call back at some point this would remain, unless as Erika says he waited more than 30 days in which case he'd have to do another claim. If at any point after he's completed the series of questions someone withdraws the claim it will require them to put an explanatory note as to why, and this pulls through onto the system used to book appointments. With regards to the appointment on Monday if it was booked at any point at all - even if it was withdrawn straight after - a record of it remains on his system. So even if it wasn't outstanding by the time he turned up it wouldn't have taken too much effort for someone at the jobcentre to check if one had ever been booked for that day and time. What they said about taking the claim from the day he arrived doesn't seem right however, and if they insist I'd appeal against the decision. There are things like waiting days but there's no reason in what you've mentioned that these should start now rather than when he did the call. Out of interest do you know when he did the claim and what route (phone, internet etc) he used?
  4. All that and more is true about Hitler, but the Nazi/Third Reich comparison is overdone far too often. If you overdo the comparisons to the point where the connection is too tenuous then you risk seeming like you're just mentioning the the comparison for dramatic effect. The Nazis did give people numbers as part of removing their identity, but its a fallacy to then suggest that another government who gives people numbers and uses that number is likely to fall into the same trap. I also think that most people behind the desks and on the phone can and do "see the person" and try to get some understanding of the situation and how they can help within the confines of their job role. I don't think that has to be restricted to seeing someone in person, although that is easier, but that's not always practical however.
  5. Interesting, you seem to presume that because I'm a civil servant I have no experience of claiming benefits. In reality I have done so twice in my life, the second time recently enough to have gone through the modern processes such as the telephone based application. I don't recall any experience like that from either time. Which isn't to say that it doesn't happen but there could be other reasons than that person treating you as a number rather than as a person. I still don't see why that warrants the comparison to the Third Reich, but that's just me, I tend not to want to fall foul of Godwins law just to make a point.
  6. So its "prejudice" to call some claimants dead head scroungers but perfectly reasonable to write off DWP/JCP staff as "tin pot Hitlers" with no compassion? I'm not sure which is worse, that or the comparison between asking people for their NINO and the Third Reich. I use a NINO on my system because its faster, not because we don't care to learn/remember a customer's name. I could put in a surname and DOB but then that often brings up multiple results. Still its good to know that if I am made unemployed when the coalition gets started on the cutbacks I can look forward to being told I deserved it.
  7. By advertising vacancies they are helping find work for claimants since it provides another central point for employers to use for free. If the jobs seem similar or poorly paid then that's sadly a reflection of the country as a whole. The Job centre cannot create the jobs or make employers use the service after all. As for the personalised service notion, that would work really well... if staff numbers were increased sufficiently. Good luck with that idea whilst the coalition are busy slashing budgets across the board.
  8. My experience is pretty much the opposite, I have my current job because someone took the time to send me the details in the post and advised me of what to expect of the application process. I got my earlier job through the help of government schemes that allowed me to go through training and then got me a voluntary position with the charity that lead to paid work. However how does this relate to to the point I assume this was in response to - whether the jobcentre can be "bothered" to advertise "meaningful" vacancies? We can all have a rant about a company or organisation but how does it add any value to the topic?
  9. Many years ago when I worked in a local jobcentre I remember a gentleman who came in every fortnight to sign on. His jobseekers agreeement (or equivalent) stated that he wanted to work as a writer or poet. From the longer term staff there I found out that he'd been signing onto unemployment benefit for more than 10 years with that job aim. He never considered any other type of employment during the whole time I worked there and AFAIK had not had any employment at all for many years. Because of people like him the government brings in rules stating that people have to accept work outside their normal fields or wage after 6 months. This does not seem unreasonable... until you are the one in that situation. Now clearly the above example is extreme, but even recently I've had people turn down jobs I have found in jobsearches because the wage is too low, and the wage has been far more than twice my current salary. So after being damned for allowing such people to live off the state without taking reasonable steps to find some form of work the government is then damned for trying to force people into work. Everyone has reasons for wanting to restrict their jobsearch, and until you've been in that situation its difficult to imagine that those reasons may be quite valid. If they did not have sanctions what would they say to those people who turn down good offers of employment - "take the job or I'll shake my finger at you next week" perhaps? I'd quite like to work as a writer or in a museum, that would be meaningful to me. There's what I'd like to do, and what I have to do to earn a living. I don't particularly like my job or find it dreadfully rewarding but I took it because any job for £250 a week is better than £60 a week. So I have no major problems with people being "forced" into work. The DWP will advertise just about anything that isn't illegal or discriminatory. I therefore don't see your point on it not being "bothered" to advertise meaningful work (whatever that means since its subjective) since there's generally quite a variety on there.
  10. They're probably too busy spitting their cornflakes across the breakfast table about the latest Daily Mail rant against the Civil Service/Labour party/Tony Blair/BBC/Political Correctness (delete as appropriate).
  11. If your partner is still looking for work and able to work then he should still be able to claim JSA, but if your job is full time the chances are he'd have to claim on his National Insurance Contribution record between April 2007 and April 2009. This is known as Contribution based Jobseekers Allowance.
  12. No problems, from what you've said you sound as if you're doing enough at present to look for work, its just best that from as early as possible you have them record your genuine reason for not applying for certain jobs rather than trying to explain it weeks/months later when you may well have forgotten why you didn't (I know I wouldn't!). And yes that is where my username comes from, he is one of my favourite film characters. Technically it should be PFC Hudson but since I chose privatehudson way back when I first joined various internet forums it has kind of stuck. Nice to see someone else recognises the name
  13. whilst I sympathise that it will take so long to look at the appeal it can't be resolved by taking on more staff. The current recruitment freeze and planned redundancies suggest that this isn't a realistic option.
  14. Jobs are put onto the JCP in one of two main ways, either by the employers themselves through an internet based service, or through an advisor. Its been a while since I worked on vacancy taking but the rules don't change too much. Any job which is self employed should have a statement to that effect somewhere near the start of the vacancy and advise any applicants to see the Website of the UK government : Directgov website for info on self employment. There's two main reasons why this wouldn't take place, either the advisor that took the vacancy forgot to insert the statement or the employer didn't mention it was self employed during the process of placing the vacancy. You'd be surprised how many employers think that adverts should basically consist of "window cleaner wanted, call 01511111111" and get confused when they're asked a question like "what is the wage?". Another common problem is employers who state something to the effect of "a cook knows what they have to do" and are thrown by the idea of a job description. Its entirely plausible that they simply forgot to put on the JCP advert that it is self employed. If I was you I would speak to the advisor at the next opportunity and explain that your concerns, along with perhaps some evidence that the company's website states the position is self employed. Its better to make them aware that you're wary of applying for it than them asking you X weeks down the line why you didn't.
  15. Hmm. Unfortunately a lot of the advice I could give is in hindsight to be honest which is of limited value and may just add to your worries. Perhaps the CAB may be able to argue that you misunderstood the questions but that may rely on whether the advisor who took your claim over the phone asked them in full or not. Calls are recorded so the DWP would be able to check that if necessary for you. Ultimately I don't really know much about the Fraud Investigation side of things so perhaps Erika can provide more advice on that. When people own a property and are renting it out we take details of both incoming rent and the outgoings on the property. As it is considered capital we usually also take information about when it was bought, how much it is worth, how long the lease is for, how much the mortgage is and so on. I presume they use this information to calculate whether you have an income or not. With regards to your last remark that is the government's point, if you can live off what you have they will expect you to do so. They'll still provide financial support for a limited period (usually 6 months) if you have paid into the system through Class 1 National Insurance Contributions and meet the other criteria such as actively seeking work. Even that can be blocked or reduced by some types of regular income such as a pension though. The system is designed to check not just if you are eligible for benefit but also whether you need it. We can argue whether this is fair or not but those are the rules.
  16. Well I was going to reply but Erika once again has done it for me In light of sotty's last reply though it really is essential to establish what the original claim was for and why they are now bringing up an overpayment.
  17. I do, I'm one of the people who takes the 45 minute call to make a new claim, so I must read out that sentence anywhere up to 15 times a day. I don't know what happened on your call but the list that follows is pretty extensive and includes the catch all category of "any other savings" so you should have had the opportunity to declare the £15,000 at that stage. As I said I don't know how that part of your call went or whether you'll be prosecuted as I have no experience of that side of the benefits system. I just wanted to make it clear to anyone reading the thread that the opportunity to discuss precise amounts of savings does exist right from the start of the claim.
  18. It is made clear at the phone call stage that an income based claim does need to know about savings. There's an entire section of the phone call that asks in turn if the customer has a current bank account, savings account, ISA, money saved for something, money from a redundancy payment and so on. If the answer to any of these is yes then it prompts the advisor to ask how much is in that type. The entire section is prefaced by a long statement "we now need to know about Savings, this includes any money, savings, investments and property in the UK or abroad that belongs to you, and this is because the benefit you wish to claim may be affected by these".
  19. Precisely, there is little choice in the matter, if its legal employment the Jobcentre can be taken to court and has been taken to court over such matters. Its worth pointing out however that jobseekers can decline to apply for any job in the sex industry (which can include less obvious roles such as a warehouse assistant for Ann Summers) without it affecting their benefit. I do find a certain irony however in the press criticising a government body for advertising sex industry jobs when I've never seen a local paper that didn't do exactly the same and probably couldn't care less about what the jobs entailed as long as they got paid for the advert. Its especially amusing when the Daily Express preaches about such matters given its owner's empire of porn channels.
  20. No problems, I can understand that things must be extremely frustrating for you. As difficult as it must be its worth remembering that the staff on the phones are almost certainly only reflecting the guidance or information given to them and have told your sister what they did in all sincerity. I only wish I knew more about the processing side of claims in order to help work out what the hold up might be. It certainly seems that you are going about things the best and most productive way though and hopefully you will soon be able to get to the bottom of things.
  21. As much as I can sympathise with your position I do rather take issue with the notion that the DWPs telephony staff are trained liars. I don't deal with ESA claims or benefit enquiries so I don't have any experience of what their processes are but I do work on new claims for JSA. The idea that I would go around deliberately lying or telling someone something I suspected to be false is ridiculous. We are in fact told to very specifically not give advice on time-scales, definite entitlement or amounts since that role falls to people like Decision Makers. If I was instructed to deliberately lie to customers then I'd be taking it up with the Union, and if that got nowhere I'd probably resign.
  22. For someone not too concerned with how you've been treated you've spent a lot of time on this thread complaining about it. I don't see why it doesn't make sense to convert some of that time into getting either a written apology and/or compensation. I'm glad you put the appeal in though, hopefully that will come back with a positive result. I have no idea if its the standard reply but there simply isn't any part of my job or the new claims process that identifies travellers/gypsies, let alone provides them with preferential treatment. On the other hand given that I spend around 20-30 minutes with most callers I usually end up being told at some point why they are NFA and I've never had one give any indication that they are a traveller. Given that there's probably around 200,000 of them at most in the UK I don't find it that surprising that I've not dealt with one. I'm not trying to say they don't claim, but the enormous majority of NFAs have either been kicked out of their parent's home, split from a partner or somehow lost their previous home. Its usually a temporary thing since there's only so long someone can kip on a friend's floor/sofa. If I was content to just spout the party line I would hardly spend part of my spare time looking around this forum and on occasion where possible trying to offer advice about the part of the benefit system I know about would I? As I've said before I do deal with it on the rare occasions it comes my way, and not by the way just by putting the phone down. I don't see why I would give my job up over it or overreact in the ways you suggest since it doesn't play an important part in my life. I dislike people spouting off in what I consider to be an ill informed way and tend to speak up that's all. Its a fault I have been trying to correct since it results in me spending far too much time on internet forums like this one, usually getting into discussions with people whose mind is already made up. I never said they didn't get DVDs or make claims for that matter, I merely pointed out that most NFAs are not travellers and giving them DVDs to inform them of potential benefits doesn't represent discrimination any more than advertising benefits to elderly people would. There is a difference between making people aware of eligibility for benefits and discriminating in favour of them when they make that claim.
  23. Not at all, apart from that not being my point I could think of a few constructive ways in which you could continue such as making a formal complaint about the treatment and/or an appeal against the decision. Both of which will get you further than complaining about the treatment on an online forum and might get some action taken against the person or persons who you feel treated you badly. Might I suggest you resist the urge to refer to foreign nationals or travellers in either though. As for being flippant every time you have discussed verbal abuse you give the distinct impression that you think it is irrelevant and the staff are just blowing it out of proportion. I find that a strange stance for someone who has been on the receiving end of workplace abuse in the past since you should know what its like. We don't all have to treat it as a hazard of work. If my reply doesn’t go much further than that then I’m afraid its because I know very little about HRTs or benefit processing in general, so I’m not likely to go into depth about something I’m neither trained in or familiar with. Perhaps they have, since I’ve not knowingly dealt with a single one in 18 months of taking claims I don’t know what they do or don’t get and there's certainly no part of my role that would single them out anyway. The vast majority of people who are NFA aren’t travelllers in the common sense of the term (i.e. another term for gypsy which appears to be the context you are using it in), they’re people who are kipping on a friend’s sofa or moving from one place to another without actually having to sleep on the streets. As to if its discrimination not really, the government tries various schemes to try and reach out to people who might be missed by traditional methods. Its no more discrimination than advertising pension credit to people who may be unfamiliar with state support but in need of it. Co-oncidentally on the issue of missed letters if they’re anything like callbacks the fact that you did not receive them is not necessarily an indication of whether they were sent out or not.
  24. You'll always find some problem people in any organisation that employs so many staff. However if a manager caught a staff member speaking in a derogatory tone to customers they have and will be pulled on it - I've seen it happen. It is a big issue in some cases yes, but we have a choice as advisers, we can warn the person to stop talking in that fashion, if they continue we will put the phone down on them. Any employer worth their salt will not allow their staff to be either verbally or physically abused, they have a duty to make reasonable attempts to prevent it. Unlike many private organisations however most government departments will never completely refuse to deal with abusive customers. They might get benefits if they meet the other requirements, they probably won't get housing costs though. The job that they're paid to do does not and should not involve any form of abuse. No customer of any organisation should have the right to treat the staff member however they feel like. I'm really suprised that you have worked in customer service and yet are so flippant about the issue. Soldiers shouldn't have to put up with being abused during parades or guard duty either. The possibility of being sent into action however is part of their job role and anyone who signs up for military service knows beforehand that its a possibility. Soldiers should not be under equipped, employees should not be verbally abused. There's no reason why we should put up with either as a society.
  25. I'm not sure about what's happened, you'll probably have to ring the JSA enquiry line for that information. With regards to Rapid Reclaims however that can be triggered by you signing off and then reclaiming a benefit within 26 weeks of signing off. It doesn't have to be because you started work, it could also be because you went abroad or missed an appointment. The only slight issue that might come up would be that you seem to be moving from JSA onto a government training course. If you did call to make a Rapid Reclaim one of the first questions is "are you claiming JSA because you've been on a training course and this has now ended". If the answer to this is yes then the people in the contact centre will advise you to call your adviser in the jobcentre to get back onto JSA. From what you've said so far this would seem to be the route you'd do, but you might want to check that in the jobcentre since I think there's a time limit after the course ends to speak to the adviser, after that it has to be a rapid reclaim (assuming you're still within 26 weeks at that point).
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