Transitional protection less each month

Jane315STARX

My Universal credit T.P has gone down each month since June.Its literally halved.I have messaged on the journal but no replies.Has anyone else had this?

worried33

This sounds unusual, if possible are you able to post your payment statement, so can see a breakdown of any deductions and award, ideally also one where the TP was double, although bear in mind the TP would have gone down a bit in April/May for the annual uplift.

Kimi87

Transitional Protection is added if your total UC award is lower than legacy benefits. This is so at the time of transfer you aren't worse off. This does erode over time as other elements go up or new elements are added.

Have you perhaps recently had a rent increase or a new element awarded? Either of those would reduce your TP.

Jane315STARX

I had a rent increase

Jane315STARX

Also now this morning ive just seen that instead of directly paying my landlord they have paid the money to me.I have no idea what is going on.All of this is actually making me stressed and ill

Kimi87

The rent increase will have reduced your Transitional Protection, this is correct.

Obviously not paying your landlord directly isn't correct, all I can recommend is adding a Journal note (using the payment option) asking them to correct the mistake.

Jane315STARX

Ok thankyou.my tp has gone from £79 in April to £29 now

Kimi87

If your rent increased by a correspondence amount then as advised the reduction in TP is correct.

Jane315STARX

It increased by £5 a month

Kimi87

Rates for standard allowance, LCWRA etc went up in April, so those increases would have also reduced your Transitional Protection alongside the rent increase.

Depending on your assessment period dates it might not have started until May (my AP is 25th to 24th so I saw no changes until May statement/June payment).

Jane315STARX

Thankyou im trying to keep calm but I suffer with extreme anxiety so I do apologise.I absolutely hate everything about U.c and have not had any good experiences with them

worried33

I apologise, when I said it isnt normal to go down by such a big %, I didnt consider that your TP might have been small to begin with.

Jane315STARX

I have tried contacting u.c all day by phone and cant get through so ive left messages on the journal.In relation to the rent being directly paid to landlord like it always has been.I contacted the landlord.They couldn't understand this either and said that unless I'd had a review ( which I haven't).It seems like human error.So they will try and speak with u.c on my behalf but it could take a few weeks to sort out.It still appears my income is now down by £200 this month and none of it makes sense.