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UC pack for new claimants
‘Non-repudiation appointment’
???
Wot????
Confirmation too that they want photo ID. Could be a problem for some people.
I had also understood that the pack would mention Short Term Benefit Advances - it doesn’t much except on page 5 about help in the first three weeks.:
‘For some people, waiting five weeks to
get their first payment will be difficult.
Support may be available, within the
first three weeks, if you find yourself
in this position.’
And what is that help? Stampede for the local discretionary funds or food banks?
I assume JC+ will try to cover STBA in the first interview - but what if the prevuiouis practice of delicately not mentioning them carries on?
And what happened to this?:
“an Account Developer will make contact with the claimant via telephony…..”
or
“an Account Developer will phone the claimant”, in plain English…...
Someone at the DWP appears to have swallowed a dictionary!
Is all this jargon and management ***** really necessary or informative?
[ Edited: 3 Mar 2015 at 01:50 pm by shawn mach ]“Non-repudiation”. “Account Developer”. “Telephony”. Why are these terms getting as far as publication?
To be fair, these are staff instructions, which may be perfectly clear to their intended audience, but there’s still some amazingly clunky language in there!
The pack says the claimant needs to bring:
” One item of ID containing your photo
- your UK Passport. If you don’t have
one, your UK driving licence (if it has a
photo).”
But doesn’t go on to say what to do if the claimant has neither. Has anyone known a claimant experience any difficulties with this?
From this month, Universal Credit claimants are meant to start using ‘Verify’, the commercial identity assertion process. The website says “You will need your mobile phone”.
Hi Gareth, hope you are well.
Gosh- hadn’t realised it was from this month already. Lots of changes at the moment! So what happens if they don’t have a driving licence OR a passport OR a mobile phone!?
Can you point us in the direction of the regs or guidance that mentions Verify starting this month? It seems to have passed me by.
The website says “You will need your mobile phone”.
and there are still people who don’t have a mobile phone (not many, i don’t suppose, but there will be a fair few nationwide).
The timetable here for the Verify roll-out still says:
Universal Credit digital service trial Due to connect by March 2015
However, all the services already “connected” are listed as either in beta, or in ‘private beta’, which might suggest it won’t be a big-bang switch-on??
The general info put out about Verify suggests that email or landline will/might be an alternative to mobile phone (but, who knows if this will happen in practice?):
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/introducing-govuk-verify/introducing-govuk-verify
When you need to prove who you are in order to access a service on GOV.UK, you can choose who you’d like to verify you from a list of certified companies.
The company performs some checks before verifying your identity to GOV.UK, such as questions only you know the answer to. You’ll also be asked to enter a code you receive on your mobile phone, by email, or through a call to your landline. This is known as 2-factor authentication.
Verifying your identity for the first time usually takes 10 minutes and is completely online.
Once you’ve verified your identity, it’s fast and simple to use the same company every time you need to access a service on GOV.UK.
It sounds like two-factor authentication will only be needed for the initial registration, not every contact ..?
——-
[editing to add: I note that the text of the page I quoted above has now changed, to remove the reference to landline or email as alternatives to mobile for receiving the authentication code. They’ve also changed the expected time to initially verify from 10 minutes to 15 minutes. I guess it’s just too early in the roll-out to get a picture of what this process will actually look for a UC claimant ...]
Yes, the update to Verify that came out about a week ago added “digital service trial” to the Universal Credit entry. The Verify site only lists mobile phones as being needed; no mention of alternatives.
And according to HB direct today - http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/news/item/existing-benefit-loans-and-debts-to-be-migrated-to-universal-credit-live-se - the assumption is that the current ‘live service’ claims aren’t going to be moved to the digital service until end of roll-out in 2018/19 so may be a while before this impacts - just the little area in Sutton at the moment which is trialling the digital service.