1. This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies. Learn More.

Housing Benefit will be sanctioned for part time workers

Discussion in 'Serious' started by Darkwisdom, 28 Feb 2014.

  1. Darkwisdom

    Darkwisdom Level 99 Retro Nerd

    Joined:
    27 Aug 2011
    Posts:
    2,675
    Likes Received:
    64
    Bad enough is the debate with bedroom tax, universal credit and widespread sanctions by sadistic Job Centre Staff, more and more people in the UK will have this problem.

    http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/dwp-housing-benefit-will-be-sanctioned/7002330.article#.UxDc3-uwRCU

    Basically, if you only work part time you're probably claiming housing benefit to help with the costs of living. Now, if you work under 35 hours a week and the DWP deem that you're not looking hard enough to get into full time work, you will lose your housing benefit via a sanction. And with the problem with sanctions, it will probably happen permanently.

    Now people are not just being punished for not working, they're being punished for not working hard enough. I'm unemployed and very unhappy about it; I wish to be off their books as soon as, but full time work is very hard to find. Companies don't offer full time work so they don't have to offer any in work benefits like pensions and healthcare, and other companies offer zero hour contracts that offer no stability.
     
  2. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,731
    Likes Received:
    2,210
    Don't worry too much: what goes around, comes around. If housing benefits become less of a cash cow for landlords, it effectively depresses rent prices --after all no point in pricing yourself out of the market. Meanwhile people who cannot afford private rented accommodation become a burden on the government as all those people need housing, creating an increased demand for council housing.

    This is not what the government wants. It wants to privatise housing, so it needs to balance keeping social welfare spending low with making private letting an attractive proposition for landlords. Moreover the election is coming around in a few years, and the more people you alienate...

    Don't get too pissed off with Job Centre staff. They are just poorly paid drones who follow orders because they don't want to end up on the other side of the table. They all have mortgages to pay, kids to feed. Those orders are handed down by stressed managers who are in the same position, etc. Treat them like human beings, and they will see you like a human being. And it is very hard to be a **** to another human being.
     
  3. ripmax

    ripmax Minimodder

    Joined:
    8 Apr 2010
    Posts:
    370
    Likes Received:
    29
    I don't know how landlords are using housing benefits as a cash cow, when I was looking for a place to live I found it impossible to find a landlord who would accept me because I was on housing benefits. I had to go through the council.
     
  4. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,731
    Likes Received:
    2,210
    It is (possibly) a guaranteed income. Weighed against that is the fact that letting is a risky business. For every ten tenants who pay their rent on time and look after the property, there may be one is always in arrears and absolutely thrashes the place --and then takes ages to evict in a costly legal process-- who will wipe out the profit margin on the ten who behave. Some just don't want to take the risk and just want to rent to young, well-earning professionals.

    It sucks, basically. I think we should have way more social housing. People living in decent, healthy, affordable circumstances comes back to benefit the whole of society in thousands of ways.
     
  5. Darkwisdom

    Darkwisdom Level 99 Retro Nerd

    Joined:
    27 Aug 2011
    Posts:
    2,675
    Likes Received:
    64
    Unfortunately I can't see it that way. I've worked out that there are two types of Job Centre staff.

    1. Those who hate their job but have been doing it so long they no longer have anywhere else to go. They take out their frustration on jobseekers, handing out sanctions for absolutely no reason. They know it's wrong, but find it hard to stop because they need an outlet. I understand they're frustrated, but some of them are just cruel and ruthless with by the book rules and refuse to accept any loopholes or reasoning that is thrown towards them.

    2. Those who genuinely care, but have the fortitude and attitude to do well. They are only an advisor for a short time and work their way up to the next level, working for DWP or a different department, working a new job that pays better with better benefits and is more fulfilling.

    Number 2's aren't there very long, and you get disappointed because you'll have to see a number 1 again.

    Unfortunately the councils are throwing everyone out on their behinds. Whether it's sanctions or the bedroom tax. There aren't enough one bedroom places for people that need to downsize.
     
  6. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,731
    Likes Received:
    2,210
    The number 1's are suffering from cognitive dissonance. They have to be shits to people to keep their jobs, suffering the frustrated and insecure bullying by stressed line managers and the hostility of the clients who they have to be shits to in order to keep their job.

    How do you deal with that? Why, you depersonalise the victim. After a while you tell yourself that the rules are fair, that the clients are slackers who probably got in the fix they're in by their own indolence and that you are just a decent person trying to do a difficult job as fairly as possible.

    Not convinced? The last time you walked past a homeless beggar looking for hangouts, what did you think? What do you think of alcoholics? Of prison inmates? Of prostitutes? Are we empathising yet?

    Nobody is all good or all bad. We all occupy both sides of the desk at some point in our lives.
     
    Fizzban likes this.
  7. Darkwisdom

    Darkwisdom Level 99 Retro Nerd

    Joined:
    27 Aug 2011
    Posts:
    2,675
    Likes Received:
    64
    We can always rely on you to soften the blow with some honest psychology Nexxo.

    What they're doing isn't fair though. Someone spoke their mind about the system in my local job centre and got sanctioned for being honest. And it wasn't swearing, calling everyone an a******, they were just saying they didn't think the system was working; and everything he was doing seemed pointless when they just keep upping the pressure. That isn't 'doing a difficult job fairly', it was just being ruthless and oppressive.
     
    Last edited: 28 Feb 2014
  8. Weekly_Estimate

    Weekly_Estimate Random bird noises.

    Joined:
    1 Feb 2010
    Posts:
    3,679
    Likes Received:
    798
    Are you freaking nuts!? every ten tenants who pay their rent on time and look after the property there is always one...

    It's the other freaking way round, for every 10 tenants that trash and smash the place their is always one good paying one.
     
    Last edited: 28 Feb 2014
  9. Umbra

    Umbra What's a Dremel?

    Joined:
    18 Nov 2013
    Posts:
    636
    Likes Received:
    17
    My landlord will no longer rent to single women with children as they have a habit of trashing his properties (breaking windows, ripping out wiring and plumbing, smashing toilets and flooding the place) and then going to the council and saying that their accommodation is not fit to live in with children and they want a council house, they then get put into B&B at £300 a week until they get a house and he has to refurbish his property.
     
  10. Weekly_Estimate

    Weekly_Estimate Random bird noises.

    Joined:
    1 Feb 2010
    Posts:
    3,679
    Likes Received:
    798
    That's how it works! spot on!

    Between running a hotel and letting rooms in properties it's became clear that allot of people just don't give a damn about other peoples things and it's kinda sad really.

    Student Housing in Plymouth is where the cashcow is atm, Hand properties over to agency, receive rather nice large checks for doing absolutely nothing.

    edit : Not all landlords are bad, nasty, people,
     
  11. Anfield

    Anfield Multimodder

    Joined:
    15 Jan 2010
    Posts:
    7,059
    Likes Received:
    970
    The maximum amount of housing benefit serves as an artificial minimum price for rental properties, preventing supply and demand from driving prices down.
     
  12. Otis1337

    Otis1337 aka - Ripp3r

    Joined:
    28 Nov 2007
    Posts:
    4,711
    Likes Received:
    224
    Have you people actually tried getting somewhere on hosing benefits? its almost dam impossible. Landlords hate people on housing benefits!
     
  13. dangerman1337

    dangerman1337 Minimodder

    Joined:
    2 Sep 2010
    Posts:
    256
    Likes Received:
    5
    It's funny to see the current Government trying to make Housing Benefits more restrictive in an attempt to lower Housing Benefit costs yet they try to pop up heavily overvalued housing (espeically in London, that is heavily resembling a Bubble) and the scary thing is that we actually have a lot of empty housing but isn't actually on sale!
    One of the main problems with Social Housing isn't just the lack of it, it's the Right To Buy program will just have some tenants gobble it at heavily discounted prices.
     
  14. Umbra

    Umbra What's a Dremel?

    Joined:
    18 Nov 2013
    Posts:
    636
    Likes Received:
    17
    Rental prices in Cornwall are crazy, especially if it's classified as having a "sea view" if you can stand on the roof and just see the sea and horizon for that so called privilege you pay a lot, bed sits are about all you can rent on benefits and can often cost £100 a week, letting agencies won't touch anyone on benefits and many properties are seasonal so unless you can afford the big rent increases that happen in the summer holiday period you have to get out.

    House prices in Cornwall are very expensive and the locals can't afford them so many properties have been bought as second holiday homes and sit empty most of the year :wallbash:

    I don't understand why so many landlords are anti-benefit because the rent cheque and any deposits go straight to the landlord or that's how it works in Cornwall, so they always get their money, there are good and bad tenants regardless if their working or on benefits.
     
    Last edited: 1 Mar 2014
  15. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,731
    Likes Received:
    2,210
    That is exactly what I am saying. It is a cardinal rule in management that a manager does not let problems rise to the next level of management. This is so managers at the top do not get bogged down in the micromanagement of issues that could have been handled more appropriately at lower levels. Of course such a system has its problems. In practice it often creates a layered system of denial and avoidance.

    So line managers, in fear of their own job, have to reduce their own cognitive dissonance and quell dissent in the ranks before it reaches the next layer of management. So the last thing they want is staff pointing out the obvious: that they are all powerless colluders in a dysfunctional and abusive system.

    Well, I was trying to be measured... :p

    The Right to Buy scheme was the government's way of privatising council housing. This is also why it is encouraging people to buy their home with mortgage assistance schemes --they just don't want the cost and hassle of running council housing and much prefer people to be responsible for keeping their own roof over their heads. The Right to Buy was a disastrous scheme which has decimated council housing, and is one reason why we don't have enough suitable and affordable accommodation now.
     
    Last edited: 1 Mar 2014
  16. RedFlames

    RedFlames ...is not a Belgian football team

    Joined:
    23 Apr 2009
    Posts:
    15,401
    Likes Received:
    2,996
    IIRC that's how it used to work [and still does for some], however from what i gather the Universal Credit scheme does away with this and pays it to the claimant, increasing the likelihood [even if only slightly] of them not getting paid...


    And there's always been some element of 'lets make this as difficult as possible so a large chunk of people just give up and don't bother', be it with benefits, [arts mainly] grants, or generally trying to get *them* [whoever *them* happen to be] to give you money... They're quick enough to take it, but you try getting some [back] from them...
     
  17. Weekly_Estimate

    Weekly_Estimate Random bird noises.

    Joined:
    1 Feb 2010
    Posts:
    3,679
    Likes Received:
    798
    ^^

    This went to the city council housing with a tenant seen a officer with me, his words "if you pay my rent directly to me i will spend it on booze and drugs and wont pay my rent please pay it to my landlord. The officers reply? Sorry we have to send payment directly to the tenant. :duh:
     
  18. law99

    law99 Custom User Title

    Joined:
    24 Sep 2009
    Posts:
    2,390
    Likes Received:
    63
    I always concealed it. You just have to say they are OK with it. They don't seem to check. I did it twice for 6/7 month unemployed stints. To be fair though, I was never more long term than that. And to be clear, I could have found a job if I'd taken anything... I.e. cleaning, hotel work, bar work etc. I just wanted something more comfortable.
     

Share This Page