Interview under caution-DWP-

[trebormoinet]

Yes, because you can't make a sweeping generalisation. Because of the different benefits and reasons. You most certainly cannot label a sick person with the same brush as a JSA claimant who refuses to get off their ass and work (this is a minority of JSA claiments)

I label people who refuse get off their ass to work just as deserving as the sick to have the financial support, albeit at a lower rate.

[Shoelover]

I label people who refuse get off their ass to work just as deserving as the sick to have the financial support, albeit at a lower rate.

 

Let's not go there.....

[antone]

Let's not go there.....

 

Agreed. Let's just drop the speculation about other peoples' motives, eh?

[SquishySummer]

Neither can you make a sweeping generalisation about DWP staff! You can't compare someone who works in a call centre with an investigator or a visiting officer. Most of your experience of staff is the call centres.

All I am trying to say is don't demonise us all because some staff are rude & unpleasant.

Just like people on benefit it's a diverse bunch but actually i personally know a lot of staff that go out of their way to help.

Shall we move on now? Have you looked at your figures again?

 

 

Ok, you are right. I cannot label you all the same. And yes, all my experience is with call centre staff, I just find it hard to believe. Never mind.

 

Yes, I have looked at my figures again & taking off underlying entitlement using the HB online calculator. HB would only be £480 (give or take a few £)

 

And Esa would be nearer the £4000 mark. Which I am aware is still over the prosecution limit. And I have gone through everything, and spotted my mistakes.

 

On my phone bill for May '14 I made a phone call to HMRC (on the day my husband started working) the phone call was 42 mins long- after that I made a phone call to DWP, I t wasn't for very long and was at 4:47 and if i remember correctly, I put the phone down as i didn't have time to wait on hold. and then never got round to it after that, Stupid mistake & yes I most certainly should have rang when the money was coming in my account, but something in my brain was telling me I had already told them & it was their problem to sort out. Well, now i am paying for it. I deeply regret it.

[SquishySummer]

I label people who refuse get off their ass to work just as deserving as the sick to have the financial support, albeit at a lower rate.

 

That is your opinion and you are entitled to it...I'm not arguing with you.

[estellyn]

Neither can you make a sweeping generalisation about DWP staff! You can't compare someone who works in a call centre with an investigator or a visiting officer. Most of your experience of staff is the call centres.

All I am trying to say is don't demonise us all because some staff are rude & unpleasant.

Just like people on benefit it's a diverse bunch but actually i personally know a lot of staff that go out of their way to help.

Shall we move on now? Have you looked at your figures again?

 

I've worked for the DWP and repped clients against the DWP with many hundreds of hours trying to sort out benefit problems for clients.

 

Call centre staff tend to be prickly as they get a whole lot of abuse, attitude and blame. It's not right that client communication suffers as a result, but it's what happens. When I worked for the DWP we answered our own calls for the claims we handled. We could give an answer, sort out a problem and deal with things directly, in my opinion this worked much better.

 

I've dealt with hundreds of DWP staff and most there to help. They have a bad day just like anyone - I've had dWP staff say to me 'sorry I was short with you yesterday, everything was getting on top of me'. I've had a DWP staff member cry on the phone because they were struggling so much. Most want to help. Unfortunately there are so many things tying their hands it is hard to do, and as a result they get frustrated, abused by the public and jaded.

 

My principle has always been - as a DWP decision maker, as a benefit adviser or as a claimant to treat others how I would want to be treated in the same position. It's all we can do, and remember that the voice on the other end of the phone belongs to a person, just like us.

[Shoelover]

My principle has always been - as a DWP decision maker, as a benefit adviser or as a claimant to treat others how I would want to be treated in the same position. It's all we can do, and remember that the voice on the other end of the phone belongs to person, just like us.

 

My principal exactly too & its served me well in the 22years I have spent working in benefits.

I do agree with your comments re call centre staff- I'd hate their job!! They take the flak day in day out. No excuse for being rude I know

[Shoelover]

Ok, you are right. I cannot label you all the same. And yes, all my experience is with call centre staff, I just find it hard to believe. Never mind.

 

Yes, I have looked at my figures again & taking off underlying entitlement using the HB online calculator. HB would only be £480 (give or take a few £)

 

And Esa would be nearer the £4000 mark. Which I am aware is still over the prosecution limit. And I have gone through everything, and spotted my mistakes.

 

On my phone bill for May '14 I made a phone call to HMRC (on the day my husband started working) the phone call was 42 mins long- after that I made a phone call to DWP, I t wasn't for very long and was at 4:47 and if i remember correctly, I put the phone down as i didn't have time to wait on hold. and then never got round to it after that, Stupid mistake & yes I most certainly should have rang when the money was coming in my account, but something in my brain was telling me I had already told them & it was their problem to sort out. Well, now i am paying for it. I deeply regret it.

 

 

Even 4k doesn't always land you in court. Even if that were to happen, the speed at which you have acted & your obvious remorse will go in your favour when magistrates look at your case. That's IF it happens.

 

You are doing your best to sort it out.. Please don't torture yourself over it and make yourself unwell- it will change nothing. I'm assuming you have never been before the courts before - so even if you did go to court £4k is below the "threshold" for custody.

[antone]

My principal exactly too & its served me well in the 22years I have spent working in benefits.

I do agree with your comments re call centre staff- I'd hate their job!! They take the flak day in day out. No excuse for being rude I know

 

It's a job I got out of as soon as the opportunity presented itself. I don't think I was ever rude (I hope not, anyway - I don't remember ever shouting or snapping at a claimant, though I do recall expressing frustration on a few occasions) but eight hours a day spent talking to unhappy people with every reason to be unhappy, in many cases, isn't how most people would choose to spend their time. I think the thing that upsets staff and claimants alike is that very often there isn't that much you can do. CC staff lack training (I was better trained back then than today's staff are, but even then, I lacked any deep understanding of the benefit process) and are under pressure to get the claimant off the phone as quickly as possible, and preferably without having to refer the matter to anyone else. When I got the chance to take a sideways move into processing (in an office much closer to home as well) I jumped at it.

 

None of this is to excuse rude behaviour, which obviously does happen more often than it should. But for the most part, where the DWP fails, the incompetence is systemic rather than individual, and the departmental attitude commonly mistaken for malice is really just sublime institutional indifference.

[BazzaS]

It's a job I got out of as soon as the opportunity presented itself. I don't think I was ever rude (I hope not, anyway - I don't remember ever shouting or snapping at a claimant, though I do recall expressing frustration on a few occasions) but eight hours a day spent talking to unhappy people with every reason to be unhappy, in many cases, isn't how most people would choose to spend their time. I think the thing that upsets staff and claimants alike is that very often there isn't that much you can do. CC staff lack training (I was better trained back then than today's staff are, but even then, I lacked any deep understanding of the benefit process) and are under pressure to get the claimant off the phone as quickly as possible, and preferably without having to refer the matter to anyone else. When I got the chance to take a sideways move into processing (in an office much closer to home as well) I jumped at it.

 

None of this is to excuse rude behaviour, which obviously does happen more often than it should. But for the most part, where the DWP fails, the incompetence is systemic rather than individual, and the departmental attitude commonly mistaken for malice is really just sublime institutional indifference.

 

"CC staff lack training (I was better trained back then than today's staff are, but even then, I lacked any deep understanding of the benefit process) and are under pressure to get the claimant off the phone as quickly as possible, and preferably without having to refer the matter to anyone else."

 

Not the staff's fault, but a recipe for unhappy callers and (justified) complaints.

 

Why are complex queries not "sieved out" and referred on quickly?. It would free up the 1st line staff to turn over the "easy" calls rapidly and in one step, while allowing the complex cases to be dealt with by a 2nd line team empowered to do so.

[antone]

 

Why are complex queries not "sieved out" and referred on quickly?. It would free up the 1st line staff to turn over the "easy" calls rapidly and in one step, while allowing the complex cases to be dealt with by a 2nd line team empowered to do so.

 

That was what was supposed to happen. In practice, though, if you "handed off" too many calls you'd get complaints from management. It was another of those supposedly non-existent targets, really. It's the same logic that allows the DWP to claim that there are no "targets" for Jobcentre signing advisers in terms of the number of claimants they refer to the DMs for sanction decisions: it's not a formal target, they just complain and put you on a Performance Improvement Plan if you don't meet the target that does not exist.

[estellyn]

That was what was supposed to happen. In practice, though, if you "handed off" too many calls you'd get complaints from management. It was another of those supposedly non-existent targets, really. It's the same logic that allows the DWP to claim that there are no "targets" for Jobcentre signing advisers in terms of the number of claimants they refer to the DMs for sanction decisions: it's not a formal target, they just complain and put you on a Performance Improvement Plan if you don't meet the target that does not exist.

 

I'm so happy I got out a few months before the system changed. Working directly for the client was much more rewarding, but sadly even those jobs are going now since the legal aid cuts and cuts in charities funding, and claimants suffer.

[Chester6]

That was what was supposed to happen. In practice, though, if you "handed off" too many calls you'd get complaints from management. It was another of those supposedly non-existent targets, really. It's the same logic that allows the DWP to claim that there are no "targets" for Jobcentre signing advisers in terms of the number of claimants they refer to the DMs for sanction decisions: it's not a formal target, they just complain and put you on a Performance Improvement Plan if you don't meet the target that does not exist.

 

So it's a lot of splitting hairs because targets exist but aren't defined as targets? Sounds like you got out at when the system was better

I've met a few relatively decent people - just doing the minimum and not dishing out threats

[Lilly_Monroe]

I have always been treated well by DWP staff, maybe I was one of the lucky ones, but I cannot complain on how I was ever treated.

I have even been apolgised to on a couple of occasions for having to attend interviews - but that is not their fault it's the systems.

My DWP adviser could not have been more understanding/helpful to me.

 

The call centres are different, but they only have a potted history and I am not good over the phone, so maybe some of the blame is also mine, but I have never been spoken to rudely - given the wrong info a few times.

 

I have had set backs like most people who have to deal with the system on a regular basis, and many times I have asked on here for further information to help me understand something .

 

I hope you get your problems sorted soon.

[BazzaS]

it's not a formal target, they just complain and put you on a Performance Improvement Plan if you don't meet the target that does not exist.

 

Only in Kafka, Monty Python ....

ohh, or the Civil Service!

[Chester6]

Only in Kafka, Monty Python ....

ohh, or the Civil Service!

 

Or when the Tories are in charge

[SquishySummer]

Ok, so I have received my over payment amounts. In total, it is £3088.47, this is so much less than what I originally thought it was going to be!

 

Can I assume this will not get me a 24 week prison sentence??

[Mr.P]

Can I assume this will not get me a 24 week prison sentence??

 

The DWP can not hand out custodial sentences, only a judge in a court can. So unless the case gets referred to the CPS (unlikely for £3K), you will not be going to prison.

[Shoelover]

Even if the case is referred to the CPS you will not be looking at a custodial for £3k.