Woke up this morning to find that my potentially last Job Seekers Allowance didn’t show up in my bank account. I was told by my work coach that I would be covered until my first pay cheque/deposit. This highlights my biggest complaint with the benefits system that I have been relying on for the past six months – it’s messy and confusing.
When I signed up for the new style Job Seekers Allowance (JSA) they recommended I sign up for Universal Credit too (if only to ensure that I could cover interest on mortgage payments after 3 months of not being able to find work if I needed it). UC payments are made monthly, JSA payments are made every two weeks. But because I had applied and was claiming JSA, it effectively wiped out any and all JSA payments. So my UC statements allow show a payment of £0.00 for each month I was unemployed. But I don’t get any statements for JSA.
If you miss an appointment or fail to carry out the requirements of the work plan, they can apply sanctions against your payments. This, to my knowledge, never happened during all the time I claimed. When I got confirmation of the UAL contract I spoke to my work coach earlier this month to confirm that I had the job. She explained that I would still get JSA for the remainder month. But no end date was ever given or confirmed. When I received a payment on the 11th March, it was for £40 less than previous payments.
So I’ve used the Universal Credit journal (which is effectively used for *everything* including JSA) to reach out and ask what’s happening and to obtain clarification around the whole situation. Now, accordingly to UAL’s employee portal, I should be paid on the last day of this month – and after that, everything should start returning to normal with regards to my finances.
Don’t get me wrong, I am incredibly grateful to the UK government and the local Woking JobCentre Plus for supporting them throughout the redundancy and the time I’ve been off-work (and to Supermassive Games for providing a good and decent severance package) which has supported me well for six months. But I do wish there was better information and systems surrounding JSA and UC (combined) so that I know exactly when I’m being paid, and what I’m being paid.