On the bench - keep warchest to pay salary or splunk it all on dividendand claim JSA?

[doodab]

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I'm sure you are well placed to know, having likely watched every episode with shameful fervour .


That'd be 'Shameless', by the way.

Loser.

[fullyautomatix]

Psychocandy happened

WHS. Normally he is hanging around the Business forum chatting about JSA with the regulars there. Not sure what happened in this case, he seems to have grown a bit in confidence and decided to plunge headlong into General.

[mudskipper]

Surely if you drain the warchest into personal accounts you will be over some limit for savings to claim JSA?

Contribution based JSA isn't means tested - you can get it for 6 months if you've paid your NI.

[SimonMac]

I'm sure this question has been asked before, not sure the posters name who asked it though, have you tried searching?

[mudskipper]

IMO, FWIW, the time to claim JSA is when you've been benched for a while, can't get work and your warchest is running low. Not for a month between gigs when you've still got money in the business account.

[eek]

WHS. Normally he is hanging around the Business forum chatting about JSA with the regulars there. Not sure what happened in this case, he seems to have grown a bit in confidence and decided to plunge headlong into General.

Nope. The mods (NAT) have got fed up with him in the professional forums (As he is not a professional) so they moved the thread to General as it's were it deserves to be

[psychocandy]

Surely if you drain the warchest into personal accounts you will be over some limit for savings to claim JSA?

Of course, this only works if you have limited savings. There is a limit (18K I think).

But its a bit of a grey area about whether you can leave the money in the warchest. They've never ever asked me about the ltd company account but I have heard stories of them telling people to use the money in the company account regardless of whether its earmarked for vat or ct (which sounds a bit dodgy to me).

Its a bit of a minefield to be honest.

[psychocandy]

But you have got more than bugger all. You have retained profit in the company that pays for your bench time.

No. Last time I took it all out. Not sure of the rules with this but they never asked me about the company account. I know some people do get asked though if there was money in the business account.

With me all they asked was:-

So you're not working at the moment? No.
So you're contract ended? Yes.
Who was your employer? Ltd company of which I am Director.
OK. Fair enough we're happy.

To be honest, never even asked me for P45. They did send a letter addressed to Mr P. Candy, ltd co, address asking me to confirm why Mr P. Candy had ceased employment with Ltd Co though. (I think this is normal to check you haven't been sacked or quit - you don't get benefits then)

That was bit weird. Just ticked the box saying work had temporarily ceased and that was it.

[psychocandy]

Well you don't qualify as you had an extension offered. On that basis you have made yourself intentionally unemployed and therefore don't qualify...

This would be true I guess. Not on about now for me - I'm fine at the moment. Was just discussing changes with the new salary recommendations.

Grey area though. OK, so you turn down an extension for 'business reasons' and end up on the bench. Not sure if the JSA people could do anything.

For instance, an example. A small manufacturing company decides not to take on a contract because they decide its not in their interests. Upshot is they've got to make a few people redundant. JobCentre are not going to come knocking and telling them its their fault and they're ex-employees can't claim JSA.

Also, JobCentre would have no visibility of how you're contract deals were going.

BUT, I wouldnt do that. Crap contract is still way better than JSA

[psychocandy]

I did JSA early years, only once.

It isn't worth the effort (unless you and your company are totally skint).

3 month's worth of JSA would pay you around £800-ish, I could earn that in a couple of days contracting.

Enjoy life a bit while on the bench IMO - don't spend it filling out forms, or in queues or interviews in the Job Centre

Know what you mean. Its is minor hassle sometimes. If I was minted I wouldnt bother to be honest.

I think last year I filled out all the forms and then got a gig after 10 days. Obviously, in that case it wasnt worth the grief for £70.

But when on the bench for 3 months it was a bit extra. Thats just it you don't know how long bench time is going to be.

To be fair, most of the JSA staff are OK. Once its set up its just literally 5 mins every 2 weeks to sign.