Claiming benefits

Hi all

My organisation mainly focuses on debt advice with a basic knowledge of benefits. I’m just trying to understand the process of claiming benefits to make sure our advisers give the best guidance we can before referring them on for specialist benefits advice.

The Governments announcement regarding benefits for people affected by coronavirus focused on UC and new style ESA, there was no real mention of New Style JSA.

I’m aware that New style JSA is dependant on NI contributions but assuming they qualify do benefits advisers tell people to claim this first? The main advantages to the client being that its not means tested and they don’t have to wait 5 weeks like UC. The client can then claim additional UC (the amount being reduced by the amount of JSA they get).

If the client is better claiming new style JSA, is this a separate application and would the client apply for new style JSA first and UC after or the other way round?

My concern is obviously people applying for Universal Credit, being turned down due to capital/assets and then not claiming new style if they are able to. If the client applies for UC online and gets turned down are they directed in anyway to apply new style JSA.

More generally is there a reason that new style JSA has not really been mentioned in the Government statements?

Thanks for any help you can provide!

If in doubt, claim both i.e. new style JSA and UC or new style ESA and UC.  With many people, they won’t know whether they’re entitled to a contributory new style benefit unless they claim, and if they wait for decision on that before claiming UC, they’re probably losing benefit that way.

National Debtline - 22 April 2020 03:00 PM

More generally is there a reason that new style JSA has not really been mentioned in the Government statements?

 

I am guessing it’s either cock-up or conspiracy.

Perhaps things are just so chaotic that they haven’t really given it much thought. Or they think the temporary higher rates in UC make claiming NS-JSA pointless (we’ve probably all heard of clients being told by JCP that there’s no point claiming NS-ESA or NS-JSA because it just gets deducted from their UC - but curiously then insisting that they need to claim CA if they want a carer’s element).

Or they don’t want to raise too much awareness of a benefit which so often goes unclaimed by people when they lose their jobs. There is a risk that a whole generation of people will understand that there is a benefit they can claim when they lose their job, even if they have savings or their partner is working - that sort of thing shouldn’t be encouraged.

Or perhaps they want to capitalise as much as possible on the UC migration possibilities - all those people who were getting tax credits and a little bit of HB - rather than just adding NS-JSA, let’s get them on to UC!

Although to be fair, it could just be to do with complexity. You need to give people a simple message in an emergency like “proceed to the nearest muster station” rather than “proceed to the muster station unless you have made sufficient NI contributions over the past two benefit years before the current tax year in which case proceed to the forward muster station on the port side on deck 4”.

Timothy Seaside - 23 April 2020 08:43 AM

it’s either cock-up or conspiracy.

That’s just the definition of the benefits system.

HI - I have had a client today who is claiming UC as lost job in December (Has no savings or partner or children) and has been told by the DWP to make a claim for JSA (New Style) as this will pay his NI contributions whilst UC won’t . Is anyone aware of this discrepancy?

Thanks

UC does give credits, but only Class 3 credits. JSA gives Class 1 credits.

On a practical level what would the client miss out on if he just claimed UC - paying class 3 credits only. Sorry NI is a mystery to me..

Class 3 only counts for State Pension. Class 1 also counts for the second contribution condition for JSA and ESA.

All being equal, being on a dual claim is strictly better than being on UC only because (a) you can continue to get paid something if you come into capital or meet a partner who works etc. and (b) there are scenarios where you could need to claim contributory benefits a few years down the road and the additional class 1 contributions could help towards that.

The advice should probably be to claim both, but it isn’t surprising for people to take the view that making and managing a parallel nsJSA/nsESA claim isn’t worth the hassle just to cover for a few fringe scenarios.

Thanks all - I agree it is a hassle for a claimant to claim both with no clear advantage in this particular scenario at this given time.

If you claim NS JSA and UC, is it the case that you no longer qualify for the Class 1 credits, only Class 3? Checking my understanding of it.
CPAG, p970

If you actually receive NS-JSA you would get Class 1 credits.

That’s what I thought. But I am confused now- am I mis-reading?  CPAG says ’ you can be credited with earnings equal to the lower earnings limit for…. each complete week in which you are not entitled to UC but for which you satisfy, or can be treated as satisfying the qualifying conditions for JSA….’ . DRH (p74) states ‘you will not get a credit for any week in which ... you are entitled to UC for any part of the week’.

JSA credits are Class 1, and can normally be had without actually receiving JSA, but by simply satisfying the qualifying conditions for JSA - often known as a credits-only JSA claim.

However, if someone is entitled to UC, they can only get JSA credits if they actually receive JSA.

Thank you, I am clear now!