Even if you get disallowed for JSA, you can still claim HB/CTB on nil income. You will need to contact your council to claim. Being sacked for gross misconduct is not an automatic reason to be disallowed JSA although you may receive a sanction on your claim. This can only be decided by a decision maker (DM), and you can appeal against the DM's decision.

So long as you notified the LA within 1 month of the change occurring then you will be able to appeal their overpayment decision. The appeal has to be in writing, and I would not bother going to see the LA as They probably won't do anything There will be no paper trail of your visit and what was discussed In your appeal I recommend that you refer to the regulations regarding overpayment The Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 Recoverable overpayments 100 - (1) Any overpayment, except one to which paragraph (2) applies, shall be recoverable. (2) Subject to paragraph (4) this paragraph applies to an overpayment caused by an official error where the claimant or a person acting on his behalf or any other person to whom the payment is made could not, at the time of receipt of the payment or of any notice relating to that payment, reasonably have been expected to realise that it was an overpayment. (3) In paragraph (2), "overpayment caused by official error" means an overpayment caused by a mistake made whether in the form of an act or omission by— (a) the relevant authority; (b) an officer or person acting for that authority; © an officer of — (i) the Department for Work and Pensions; or (ii) Revenue and Customs, acting as such; or (d) a person providing services to the Department for Work and Pensions or to the Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, where the claimant, a person acting on his behalf or any other person to whom the payment is made, did not cause or materially contribute to that mistake, act or omission. (4) Where in consequence of an official error, a person has been awarded rent rebate to which he was not entitled or which exceeded the benefit to which he was entitled, upon the award being revised any overpayment of benefit, which remains credited to him by the relevant authority in respect of a period after the date on which the revision took place, shall be recoverable. And the Council Tax Regulations 2006 Recoverable excess benefit 83. — (1) Any excess benefit, except benefit to which paragraph (2) applies, shall be recoverable. (2) Subject to paragraph (4) and (5) and excepting any excess benefit arising in consequence of a reduction in tax or substitution to which regulation 82 refers, this paragraph applies to excess benefit allowed in consequence of an official error, where the claimant or a person acting on his behalf or any other person to whom the excess benefit is allowed could not, at the time the benefit was allowed or upon the receipt of any notice relating to the allowance of that benefit, reasonably have been expected to realise that it was excess benefit. (3) In paragraph (2), "excess benefit allowed in consequence of an official error" means an overpayment caused by a mistake made whether in the form of an act or omission by— (a) the relevant authority; (b) an officer or person acting for that authority; © an officer of— (i) the Department for Work and Pensions; or (ii) the Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, acting as such; or (d) a person providing services to the Department or to the Commissioners referred to in ©, where the claimant, a person acting on his behalf or any other person to whom the payment is made, did not cause or materially contribute to that mistake, act or omission. (4) Paragraph (2) shall not apply with respect to excess benefit to which regulation 82(a) and (b) refers. (5) Where in consequence of an official error a person has been awarded excess benefit, upon the award being revised any excess benefit which remains credited to him by the relevant authority in respect of a period after the date of the revision, shall be recoverable. This is a statue instrument and is law. Too often LA's will try and recover overpayments caused by their error and too often people will let them do so.

ESA will be looking at the Relevant Income Tax Years (RITY's) preceeding your benefit year. You need to satisfy both contribution conditions in order to get ESA(Cont). If you don't satisfy the contribution conditions, then ESA(IR) may be awarded dependant upon your circunstances i.e living with partner, partner's work hours, partner's income, capital less than £16000, your income from other benefits (DLA is disregarded). The first contribution condition. In order to qualify for contribution based ESA you must have: actually paid Class 1 contributions in one of the three last complete tax years on earnings of 25 times the lower earnings limit for that particular year; or 25 Class 2 contributions in any of the three last complete tax years; or a mixture of Class 1 and Class 2 totalling 25 in any of the three last complete tax years. Class 1 National Insurance contributions are paid by employed people as a percentage of their earnings. Class 2 NI contributions are paid by self-employed people at a standard weekly rate. The second contribution condition. In addition to meeting the first condition you must also have paid (or have been treated as having paid) Class 1 or Class 2 contributions amounting to at least 50 times the lower earnings limit in each of the two relevant tax years. The relevant tax years are those that precede the benefit year in which the claim is made. To make things a little more complex, the benefit year runs from the first Sunday in January whereas the tax year starts on April 6th. Contribution credits count as Class 1 credits and can be used to help you meet the second contribution condition. You are credited for each full week that you receive- incapacity benefit or statutory sick pay or severe disablement allowance or income support due to incapacity for work or maternity allowance or jobseeker's allowance or carer's allowance or adoption pay In your case the benefit year is 2009, so the RITY's used will be 05/06, 06/07 and 07/08.

The coating may well be laser blue, but the light emitted will be in the yellow part of the colour spectrum. Compared side by side with non coated lamps you will find that they are not as yellow. If you want "white" sidelights you would be better off getting LED's with a colour temp of around 6500K.

Even for those who are trained in benefits it can be a minefield at times; if it helps others then a few minutes of my time trying to provide clarification on benefits after/before going to work is time very well spent.

Over payment of CTB (known as excess benefit) is covered by s82 to s90 of the Council Tax Benefit Regulations 2006

No, your entitlement for HB will be from 02/06, but will not be in payment until the following benefit week beginning 08/06. This shortfall of days is added to the end of the claim, the end of a benefit claim is the end of the benefit week following the change in circumstances. HB is normally paid in arrears. You will receive a HB payment backdated to 08/06 once the claim has been processed. For example, HB decision made on 01/07: You will receive a payment for the period 08/06 to 28/06. You end your HB claim 10/07 but will be paid until 19/07.

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Replaced by The Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 Statutory Instrument 2006 No. 213

For HB/CTB purposes, the backdating would be to 8th June. This is because the benefit week runs from Monday to Sunday and HB/CTB claims are treated as made the Monday following the receipt of the claim form. In terms of payment, although you will have missed out on the period 02/06 to 07/08, you will in effect get this back at the end of the claim. Backdating and start of claim are covered by HB regulations 83(5) and 76 respectively.

In relation to your IB claim, give them a call and get clarification as to whether they need a sick note or not. Normally after you have been told sick notes are no longer required an IB50 is sent and you may be required to attend a medical on renewal. As for the doctors report for your DLA, you can get a copy of this by making a subject access request to DLA. The DWP do not make a charge for subject access requests, just some poor sole has to request the file from storage and photocopy any clerical material as well as collating all the screen prints.

The AACT of 14 days (not working days) starts from when the LA (Local Authority) has received al relevant documentation. This is set in statute under The Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 s89 which states Decisions by a relevant authority 89.—(1) Unless provided otherwise by these Regulations, any matter required to be determined under these Regulations shall be determined in the first instance by the relevant authority. (2) The relevant authority shall make a decision on each claim within 14 days of the provisions of regulations 83 and 86 being satisfied or as soon as reasonably practicable thereafter. (3) Without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing provisions of this regulation, in a case where a person— (a) made the notification specified in paragraph 2 of Schedule 7 within 14 days from the day immediately after the day on which his entitlement to income support or an income-based jobseeker's allowance ceased ("the appropriate day") and is treated as having claimed an extended payment under regulation 72(2); and (b) has made a claim, which meets the requirements of regulation 83(1), (6) and (9), within 14 days of the appropriate day, the relevant authority shall give priority to that claim over other claims which do not fall within the provisions of this paragraph. You have a period of one month in which to provide the evidence required, as per regulation 86(1) Evidence and information 86. —(1) Subject to paragraph (2) and to paragraph 5 of Schedule A1[176] (treatment of claims for housing benefit by refugees), a person who makes a claim, or a person to whom housing benefit has been awarded, shall furnish such certificates, documents, information and evidence in connection with the claim or the award, or any question arising out of the claim or the award, as may reasonably be required by the relevant authority in order to determine that person's entitlement to, or continuing entitlement to, housing benefit and shall do so within one month of being required to do so or such longer period as the relevant authority may consider reasonable. Furthermore, if the 14 day period has expeired and the LA has not made a decision then a payment on account should be made, the LA is required to make this payment without request from yourself. The payment on account is stipulated under regulation 93 (1) to 93 (3) Payment on account of a rent allowance 93. —(1) Where it is impracticable for the relevant authority to make a decision on a claim for a rent allowance within 14 days of the claim for it having been made and that impracticability does not arise out of the failure of the claimant, without good cause, to furnish such information, certificates, documents or evidence as the authority reasonably requires and has requested or which has been requested by the Secretary of State, the authority shall make a payment on account of any entitlement to a rent allowance of such amount as it considers reasonable having regard to— (a) such information which may at the time be available to it concerning the claimant's circumstances; and (b) any relevant determination made by a rent officer in exercise of the Housing Act functions. (2) The notice of award of any payment on account of a rent allowance made under paragraph (1) shall contain a notice to the effect that if on the subsequent decision of the claim the person is not entitled to a rent allowance, or is entitled to an amount of rent allowance less than the amount of the payment on account, the whole of the amount paid on account or the excess of that amount over the entitlement to an allowance, as the case may be, will be recoverable from the person to whom the payment on account was made. (3) Where on the basis of the subsequent decision the amount of rent allowance payable differs from the amount paid on account under paragraph (1), future payments of rent allowance shall be increased or reduced to take account of any underpayment or, as the case may be, overpayment. All too often LA benefit staff will try and tell you that they can take anywhere between 2 weeks and 6 weeks to process a claim, this comes from a lack of understanding of the regulations in many cases. If you have received the notification of your JSA, or as soon as you receive it, take the notification to your LA. JCP will notify the LA of your entitlement to benefit but this can take up to 4 weeks to be processed by the LA. (This is based on my experience of notifications) You may find these useful: RR2 - A guide to Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit (October 2006) The Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 The Council Tax Benefit Regulations 2006

If the ex tenant of OP's friend is receiving any form of DWP benefit, then any overpayment can be recovered from this directly.

I would put this part in at the start of the reason for appeal, citing:- The Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 Recoverable overpayments 100 - (1) Any overpayment, except one to which paragraph (2) applies, shall be recoverable. (2) Subject to paragraph (4) this paragraph applies to an overpayment caused by an official error where the claimant or a person acting on his behalf or any other person to whom the payment is made could not, at the time of receipt of the payment or of any notice relating to that payment, reasonably have been expected to realise that it was an overpayment. (3) In paragraph (2), "overpayment caused by official error" means an overpayment caused by a mistake made whether in the form of an act or omission by— (a) the relevant authority; (b) an officer or person acting for that authority; © an officer of — (i) the Department for Work and Pensions; or (ii) Revenue and Customs, acting as such; or (d) a person providing services to the Department for Work and Pensions or to the Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, where the claimant, a person acting on his behalf or any other person to whom the payment is made, did not cause or materially contribute to that mistake, act or omission. (4) Where in consequence of an official error, a person has been awarded rent rebate to which he was not entitled or which exceeded the benefit to which he was entitled, upon the award being revised any overpayment of benefit, which remains credited to him by the relevant authority in respect of a period after the date on which the revision took place, shall be recoverable. As amended by The Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2008 Amendments to the Housing Benefit Regulations relating to overpayments 4.—(1) The Housing Benefit Regulations shall be amended as follows. (2) In regulation 101 (person from whom recovery may be sought)— (a) for paragraph (2)( 13) substitute— “(2) For the purposes of section 75(3)(b) of the Administration Act (recovery from such other person, as well as or instead of the person to whom the overpayment was made), where recovery of an overpayment is sought by a relevant authority— (a) subject to paragraph (1) and where sub-paragraph (b) or © does not apply, the overpayment is recoverable from the claimant as well as the person to whom the payment was made, if different; (b) in a case where an overpayment arose in consequence of a misrepresentation of or a failure to disclose a material fact (in either case, whether fraudulently or otherwise) by or on behalf of the claimant, or by or on behalf of any person to whom the payment was made, the overpayment is only recoverable from any person who misrepresented or failed to disclose that material fact instead of, if different, the person to whom the payment was made; or © in a case where an overpayment arose in consequence of an official error where the claimant, or a person acting on the claimant’s behalf, or any person to whom the payment was paid, or any person acting on their behalf, could reasonably have been expected, at the time of receipt of the payment or of any notice relating to that payment, to realise that it was an overpayment, the overpayment is only recoverable from any such person instead of, if different, the person to whom the payment was made.”; (b) in paragraph (3A)( 14) for “paragraph (2)(a)(ii)” substitute “paragraph (2)©”; and © omit paragraph (4)( 15). (3) In regulation 102(16) (method of recovery)— (a) in paragraph (1) for “regulation 105” substitute “regulation 105(1)”; (b) after paragraph (1) insert— “(1ZA) Where an overpayment is recoverable from a claimant who has one or more partners, a relevant authority may recover the overpayment by deduction from any housing benefit payable to the claimant’s partner, or where it is unable to do so, may request the Secretary of State to recover any recoverable overpayment from the benefits prescribed in regulation 105(1B) (recovery of overpayments from prescribed benefits), provided that the claimant and that partner were a couple both at the time of the overpayment and when the deduction is made.”; © in paragraph (2)— (i) after “permitted by paragraph (1)” insert “or (1ZA)”; and (ii) after “a claimant” insert “or a claimant’s partner”; and (d) in paragraph (3) for “who has” substitute “or a claimant’s partner, where the claimant has”. (4) In regulation 105( 17) (recovery of overpayments from prescribed benefits)— (a) in paragraph (1) before “For the purposes of section 75(4) of the Administration Act” insert “Subject to paragraph (1B),”; (b) after paragraph (1A) insert— “(1B) For the purposes of section 75(4) of the Administration Act, where recovery is sought from the claimant’s partner under regulation 102(1ZA), the benefits prescribed by this regulation are— (a) income support under Part 7 of the Act; (b) income-based jobseeker’s allowance; © state pension credit; and (d) income-related employment and support allowance.”; and © for paragraph (2) substitute— “(2) The Secretary of State shall, if requested to do so by an authority under regulation 102 (method of recovery), recover a recoverable overpayment by deduction from any of the benefits prescribed in paragraph (1) or (in the case of the claimant’s partner) any of the benefits prescribed in paragraph (1B) provided that the Secretary of State is satisfied that— (a) a recoverable overpayment has been made in consequence of a misrepresentation of or a failure to disclose a material fact (in either case whether fraudulently or otherwise), by a claimant or any other person to whom a payment of housing benefit has been made; and (b) the person from whom it is sought to recover the overpayment is receiving sufficient amounts of any of the benefits prescribed in paragraph (1) or (1B) (as the case may be) to enable deductions to be made for the recovery of the overpayment.”.

Don't stop signing and looking for work as you will get a sanction for failing to seek employment and ultimately the JSA claim will be terminated. Until ESA have completely closed the claim, and that includes any outstanding actions on the claim, JSA will not be able to build their cvlaim for you. This is because both ESA and JSA use the same system (JSAPS) and both cannot be live at the same time; normally it is the other way around, JSA haven't closed their claim preventing ESA from building a new claim. Either way you need to make sure that the ESA claim has been completely closed, should JSA say that the ESA claim is still showing as live then you need to contact ESA and speak to a supervisor. With the sheer number of claims at present, these are being dealt with in date received order and unless a claim has gone past its target date it is a case of waiting. Frustrating I know. If it is more than 4 weeks since JSA received the initial claim then this should be processed as a matter of urgency as it will be past it's target date. In terms of payment you could ask for an interim payment to be made, however there is no guarantee that this will be agreed and the decision to refuse cannot be appealed. If an interim payment is made then this will be offset against any arrears payable to you. Alternatively you can ask for a crisis loan. Regards appeals for ESA, the more supporting information and evidence you can provide as to why you disagree with the decision, the better the chance that the appeal will be sucessful. You can appeal against the decision of the appeals tribunal, but to do so will involve you seeking legal advice and it is a formal legal process.

Not all of us are idiots (Don't think I'm one but then again I'm totally mad :D:D), but you do get ones who can't tell left from right which is the same for any organization. Get you med cert in ASAP and the payments will be backdated to the date of the WCA decision.

Don't mention it

Don't worry!!! It is very unlikely that the Fraud and Investigation team would become involved as your partner has declared all the information and changes he is required to. This would appear to be a case of official administrative error. JSA© is payable, where qualifying conditions are met, for 26 weeks and any income from a partner is not deducted nor taken into account. This would be paid at the applicable amount for your partners age. With moving over to JSA(IB) at the end of the 26 week period, your income and hours would be taken into account. Should this have the effect of zeroing the amount payable, because your partner still has an underlying entitlement to JSA(IB) as he is unemployed and actively seeking work, then he would be awarded credits only JSA(IB). Even with your partner being unemployed, the fact that you are working full time and over 30 hours should still entitle you to WTC. Tax credits, however, are not my area of knowledge as I don't work for HMRC so I cannot give a definitive answer on that subject area.

Something is amiss somewhere. Under the JSA(IB) rules the claim your partner made would have to have been for a couple as he would not be able to claim JSA(IB) as a single person because you co-habit. A partner of a claimant can work for up to 24 hours per week before JSA(IB) would be disallowed. I'll double check the guidance on this though on Monday. The only way your partner would have been able to claim as a single person would have been to make a claim for JSA©. This is based on NI contributions and credits in the 3 tax years previous to the benefit year in which the claim was made. JSA© would only have been paid for 26 weeks. In terms of WTC, either you and your partner, or either of you, need to work at least 16 hours per week to qualify. You will get a premium for working more than 30 hours per week (the 30 hours cannot be a combination of yours or partner's work hours). JSA(IB) will be reduced by the amount of income you have coming in from employment and WTC. If an official error has been made by DWP, any overpayment made cannot be recovered from your partner.

Agree with that, some of us get the ear bashing before others. @ OP Has your boyfriend received any paperwork in relation to the appeal? Why was his claim to ESA disallowed? With the large number of ESA claimants failing the WCA and being found to have no LCW, there has been a large increase in the number of appeals (no surprise) which has impacted on the Appeals Tribunal Service who now have a massive backlog of appeals to process. Some appeals are taking 6 months before they are heard.

Not if you are working more than 24 hours per week, this automatically will disallow your partner from JSA(IB). Otherwise then yes it is possible to be on JSA(IB) two years down the line, but your partner will have to comply with whatever requirements the Jobcentre impose on them such as weekly signing, attendace of training courses etc. As for the amounts, your partner should be entitled to an allowance of £100.95 (the couple's allowance). This will be reduced by the income from your employment and tax credits received. If HMRC Tax credits are suggesting that your partner should be getting an allowance of £64.30 per week, then they are assuming that this is a single JSA(IB) claim. It would also appear that they are assuming that your partner is in receipt of JSA© which is only payable for 26 weeks. Should your partner be claiming as a single person, which I doubt that they are, then this would be fraud. Similarly, should your partner have not declared your actual hours worked as being in excess of 24 hours per week, this would also be viewed as an attempt to defraud the DWP as your partner would not be entitled to JSA(IB). Both HMRC and DWP can check each others records to see what benefits or tax credits are in payment, how much tax you are paying on your income and NI comtributions for you and your partner. Both you and your partner will have agreed to this upon signing the relevant declarations for JSA and Tax credits.

To deal with the last part first. Definition of 'disability' under the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) defines a disabled person as someone who has a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on his or her ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. The definition For the purposes of the Act: substantial means neither minor nor trivial long term means that the effect of the impairment has lasted or is likely to last for at least 12 months (there are special rules covering recurring or fluctuating conditions) normal day-to-day activities include everyday things like eating, washing, walking and going shopping a normal day-to-day activity must affect one of the 'capacities' listed in the Act which include mobility, manual dexterity, speech, hearing, seeing and memory Some conditions, such as a tendency to set fires and hay fever, are specifically excluded. People who have had a disability in the past that meets this definition are also covered by the scope of the Act. There are additional provisions relating to people with progressive conditions. The DDA 2005 amended the definition of disability. It ensured that people with HIV, cancer and multiple sclerosis are deemed to be covered by the DDA effectively from the point of diagnosis, rather than from the point when the condition has some adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. In terms of SSP and benefits. SSP is payable for 28 weeks only, when SSP comes to an end your husband's employer will send a SSP1 form stating the reasons why they cannot pay SSP. At this point your husband can claim ESA (Employment and Support Allowance). IB (Incapacity benefit) is no longer available to new claimants unless they satisfy the 104 week linking rules; these are that a previous claim for IB had been in payment in the 104 weeks prior to claiming ESA and that the claimant started work within one month of the IB claim ending. There are two types of ESA, ESA(Cont) and ESA(IR). ESA(Cont) will be based upon your husbands NI contributions in the previous 3 tax years prior to the benefit year. This is known as the FCC (First Contribution Condition) and SCC (Second Contribution Condition); both the FCC and SCC have to be satisfied in order to get ESA(Cont). ESA(IR) is income related and not dependant upon NI contributions. However, a partner of an ESA claimant cannot work more than 24 hours per week, and the income from work will be deducted (net of tax and NI) from the ESA(IR) payable. Given your current circumstances your husband will be disallowed ESA(IR). ESA(Cont) and (IR) are paid at two separate phases, the assessment phanse and main phase. The assessment phase is payable for the first 13 weeks of the claim, the main phase is payable from day 92 of the claim subject to a satisfactory WCA (Work Capability Assessment); you will also be paid a component in the main phase, the amount of which is dependant upon which group you are placed into - Work or Support. A WCA is usually carried out by week 8 of an ESA claim, and the WCA focuses on what work a person is capable of doing rather than how ill a claimant is. You can claim HB (Housing Benefit) and CTB (Council Tax Benefit) now as this is also an "in work" benefit. The amount of HB/CTB you willl get will depend upon the amount of excess income to the applicable amount, the LHA (Local Housing Allowance) and how much your Council Tax is. The applicable amount, given your circumstances, is £100.95. For excess income above the applicable amount there is a taper of 65% for HB and 20% CTB, so you may well find that you get awarded HB but not CTB (or very little). All income and capital is taken into account for HB/CTB purposes unless you are receiving an income related benefit.

No as these are not income related benefits.

'Tis a sad reflection on today's society :mad: Those who cannot be bothered to do a hard day's graft get it handed on plate to them by the state. Those who graft so that they may try and make a decent wage get treated worse and pay for those who can't be bothered to work.

Only if you claim an income related benefit