UNIVERSAL CREDIT : WHAT A NIGHTMARE !

I have an intense dislike of our economic model in which huge numbers of people rely on state hand outs, otherwise known as 'benefits', for their financial wellbeing. It is a ridiculous system which is designed to give the appearance of wealth and to allow people to buy what they otherwise couldn't afford. In most cases, much of what is then purchased comes from imported goods, thus impoverishing the country, or is paid out in rent, thus enriching those who already have more than they need. In an ideal world, such a system wouldn't exist.

However, it is what we're lumbered with and for decades successive governments have fiddled around with it. The latest attempt to change it has been the introduction of co-called 'Universal Credit', a single payment designed to replace several separately assessed and paid benefits. While there is undoubted merit in such a change, this new all-encompassing benefit has not had an easy birth; in fact, it's already several years behind in its originally planned implementation schedule. Today, yet another problem has been uncovered.

Many claimants already have to wait up to 6 weeks from submitting a claim to receiving their first payment, something which has been severely criticised.  Now it has been revealed that, because many claimants are paid their wages weekly while the benefit is assessed and paid (calendar) monthly, in months in which there are 5 pay days claimants may not receive any Universal Credit and will then have to submit a new claim for it to be reinstated.

Apparently, this is how the system is designed and the government is quite happy with it; that it is utterly ludicrous is obvious to almost everyone else. Whatever one thinks of the system, for those weekly paid workers who rely on Universal Credit this can create a nightmare scenario. Not only are they denied the money they need to pay their rents and other bills in one month but in the following month as well due to the time taken to process new claims. The additional workload created for staff assessing claims has its own cost, with an estimated 100,000 claimants believed to be affected.

While Universal Credit may be a good idea, whoever designed the rules for claiming and paying it needs to be shot.