Claiming JSA on the bench?

[malvolio]

If you're a PCG member, there's a chapter-and-verse guide to the whole area on the Resources section of the main website. Quick answer is you get JSA of right, other things like mortgage interest payments are a little more complex.

[psychocandy]

I am of the view(and having read the attached thread) that if you're having to go and sign on a few months after finishing a contract because your skint then frankly you have no right calling yourself a contractor. It smacks of permiedom. In addition, if you've contracted for years and after a few months benched you need to sign on, don't have 16k in assets and have not been involved in a horrible divorce than you probably need therapy for drugs, alcohol or gambling!

One way to look at it.

Having to sign on because you're skint and signing on because you can is two different things though. I know us contractors sometimes skirt the line a bit when it comes to paying taxes but most of us do legally and, in a lot of cases, lots of it. There are people out there who've never worked and have never any intention of doing so screwing millions from the state.

If you're entitled to it - claim it I say. Might not be a huge amount but its not a great amount of hassle surely for someone to give you £70 a week for free (or whatever it is).

Does £16K savings preclude the contribution-based JSA as well though? I though things like income/savings etc didnt matter for this.

However, as I found last time, if you've got a partner who earns pretty much anything you can forget any other type of help.

[The Spartan]

Why any contractor would contemplate claiming JSA is beyond me, you are responsible for organising your own funds through the work that you do etc

Anyone want to loan me some money ...................................... just kidding lol

[psychocandy]

I did it after my 1st contract as i only had a small warchest. It was hardly worth the effort looking back.

I was only on the bench though for 4 weeks, and during this time i got about £260 iirc.

I had to give myself a P45, spend almost 2 hours filing in a form, sit through a long boring interview at the job centre, got raised eyebrows as i produced my previous months dividends vouchers as proof of previous income/etc, then had to attend a couple of other interview pretending to look for permie jobs that i had absolutely no interest in taking (as i was busy looking for other contracts).

When i found a new contract i had to fart about with a P46 re-employing myself at my ltd co.

Oh, and at the end of the tax year i had to pay tax on the £260 i "earned" while on the dole!

Unless you're *really* desperate, serious, don't bother.

Having claimed for a few short periods over the last 10 years or so I've done this a few times.

Yes, it is hassle filling out the forms. If you KNOW its only going to be for 4 weeks then maybe it is too much hassle. But ulitmately how much work is it for £65 a week?

Sometimes the job centre staff are pretty clueless when they meet someone who isnt a scrounging bum. I did have one elderly job centre lady who expected me to sign a form saying I would take any job on minimum wage within an hours travel from home. I told her that aint gonna happen for obvious reasons. In the end, manager came over and explained that this sort of agreement/form wasn't appropriate for professional people.

However, each time I've found that they will work it out in a day or two and not bother expecting you to apply for jobs in McDs etc. I think, strictly speaking, the rules are you;re allowed to set a minimum salary/ job type for a few months as well before they expect you to look for other stuff. Expect funny looks when you put minimum permie salary down as £40K or something (although to be fair these people are public service employees probably on tulipe wages)

As for proving you're looking, I just printed out a few jobserve adverts, copies of my job hunt spreadsheet. They seemed happy enough.

I never had any problems in the end. Like I said, they were OK with me if you;re polite with them. Probably a first for them to be treated like this.

[psychocandy]

If you claim JSA can you stipulate that you're only interested in contract/temporary work? Otherwise, they'll just find you a bob-salary permanent job pretty quickly.

Hmmm. Probably not but they aint gonna find you a decent permanent job are they?

Like I said, they let you specify job type and minimum salary for a few months anyway. Its not as if there are going to be decent IT jobs advertised in the job centre anyway.

I did get a call once for a job as IT assistance in a library for £12K though but they werent bothered when I said no thanks! :-)

[psychocandy]

Having used an LLP last time (never again) I finished contract, found nowt for 7 months, still had over 16k in bank (LLP remember - all came as earned income to me), claimed - nowt - not even JSA since I had no class 1 NI for last two years. Fukin' joke. I paid 28k in tax alone that last year and I got eff all.

It's not gonna happen again, if the worst happens, I will have my huge warchest (i.e. money in Ltd and peace of mind), make sure I have no visible savings, pay myself 16 hours a week, no divis and claim the fooking lot, JSA, WTC, CTC, CTB, HB, anything and everything. Will be enough to get by and warchest remains intact til next contract...

No way am I gonna play the white man this time, and if that's a racist term they can fook right off....

How comes no NI? I thought as long as you paid a salary of over £5K or so you were OK?

[psychocandy]

If you're a PCG member, there's a chapter-and-verse guide to the whole area on the Resources section of the main website. Quick answer is you get JSA of right, other things like mortgage interest payments are a little more complex.

Would concur. contrib-based JSA = easy to get.

Mortgage help = little chance.

[psychocandy]

Interesting to note a few people on here taking the moral high ground saying that contractors shouldnt claim it.

Just think there are millions out there claiming it with zero morals, screwing the system for everything. I know people who have never worked in their life and never intent to.

If you're entitled to it claim it is my opinion. You've paid the taxes/NI so why not. (However, fiddling it like someone appears to have done in this thread is not cool at all).

BTW- if anyone cant be arsed to fill the forms out, send them to me and we'll split your JSA 50/50 :-)

[GillsMan]

Ignore me.

[malvolio]

Interesting to note a few people on here taking the moral high ground saying that contractors shouldnt claim it.

Don't think there is any right or wrong, it's a personal choice and I'm totally neutral either way. Only reason I've never claimed it, despite some long bench time in recent years, is because I couldn't be bothered with all the hassle for £68 a week.