Please help, my claim has been suspended

jingle

I posted last week about maybe receiving the wrong elements on my uc claim and got advice but now uc have suspended my claim while they investigate which they said could take weeks. I’m meant to get paid on Friday what do I do? 

Alex_Alumni

Hi @jingle I'm so sorry to hear your your claim has been suspended. Have universal credit explained why they are investigating specifically?

I'm not sure how far it would get you in resolving this today, but have you contacted the UC Helpline? They might be able to at least explain the process so that you know what's going on a bit more.

I've tagged your post as unanswered so that someone with some experience or knowledge of the above can hopefully answer you! 

Do let us know if we can help any further
Alex

calcotti

Jingle. I know that what you are asking is whether or not you have been underpaid as per your other thread. I suggest you post a message pointing out that your query is about missing elements on your claim and your believe that you have been underpaid, there is no logical reason to suspend the existing payments and that you have a family of five to support. If you don't get a sensible response contact your local MP if they are any good.

jingle

I called them and the lady I spoke to said they’d try to get my case manager to call me but that she thinks it may be because I said my dad has been helping me pay my rent and that I should be on a joint claim with him if he’s paying any of my rent?? I’m so worried what I’m going to do. I don’t have time to be chasing this up and I thought joint claims are for couples??

poppy123456

jingle said:

she thinks it may be because I said my dad has been helping me pay my rent and that I should be on a joint claim with him if he’s paying any of my rent??

That's simply not correct at all. You and you're dad are not a couple and your financial circumstances are not related with regards to benefits in this way.

When you ring them you are ringing a call centre and their benefit knowledge is very limited and this just proves it. Terrible advice!

calcotti

jingle said:

I called them and the lady I spoke to said they’d try to get my case manager to call me but that she thinks it may be because I said my dad has been helping me pay my rent and that I should be on a joint claim with him if he’s paying any of my rent??

That is completely wrong. If your father gifts you money to help with your finances (regardless of what you spend it on) that has nothing to do with UC and is ignored. It appears that they have misunderstood what you said to mean that your dad is a joint tenant. Don't really understand why this would have come up at all as it has nothing to do with the issues you are actually trying to get addressed regarding the various child elements.

jingle

I didn’t think they were correct, my dad doesn’t even live in the country at the moment. I replied saying that and what you said about my query being about underpayment and they said that their advice has been correct and they won’t escalate because there is no decision to be made as I’m not entitled to extra child elements and haven’t been underpaid. They’ve also asked me to provide my bank statements now!! Is my dad giving me money each month going to cause problems? It’s just because my rent is nearly £600 more than UC help with rent so he pays the difference for me 

calcotti

If they have stated that you claim is correct in respect of the child elements and disabled child elements request a Mandatory Reconsideration of that decision. It will take time but that should force them to pass it to another Decision Maker. If the Mandatory Reconsideration is unchanged you can then appeal to the tribunal service.

The fact that your receive money from your dad will make no difference to your UC entitlement. Gifts of money (or indeed loans) are not counted as income. (I’m not clear how this issue arose.)

jingle

I’m still no closer to getting this resolved does anyone know if making a official complaint would help? I haven’t received today’s payment and they’ve said there’s nothing they can do and decisions can take up to 7 days

poppy123456

I’m not sure if a complaint will help here. I’m still confused why your claim was even suspended because you’ve been under paid, not over paid. 

calcotti

Unfortunately a complaint is unlikely to speed anything up because they are being given lower priority at the moment.