What counts as being employed?

Having recently lost my job DWP expect you to be available for work a minimum of 40 hours a week.
Just had 4th visit to extremely depressing local (30mile round trip) job centre where, quite frankly, you are made to feel as unworthy as possible. It has now been decided that minuscule NHS pension makes me ineligible for Jobseekers Allowance, which they must have known from online forms filled in 6weeks ago!
Told 'we have to go through the process', resulting in lady tearing up my paperwork in front of me.
I truly feel so sorry for others having to sign in etc.
I almost felt threatened by bloke dealing with me at first visit, apparently dire consequences if I failed to complete umpteen pieces of paper and not attending every single appointment- never on time and some lasted less than 3 minutes.
Do these people have to make things so humiliating? I had a enormous security bloke looming nearby, am sure he was listening to every word too.
Not very happy today so going to have big cup of coffee and finish off packet of chocolate biscuits whilst surfing GN, some threads never fail to make me smile!

DH used to be an area manager before he because surplus to requirements and had to visit the local job centre. He told them he was willing to take any job and any hours. They made him feel like rubbish for six months. After six months he was supposed to be able to take training courses but they said there was no money to pay for them so he couldn't. Then the jumped up little man suggested he went to the local college for free basic literacy and numeracy classes. DH pointed out that he was perfectly literate and numerate but that in the seventies it was possible to leave school with no exams whilst still being educated and how did he think he'd been an area manager if he was illiterate.

The jumped up little man said that he didn't realise DH had been a manager (it was in his file but no one had read it) and that they hadn't put him forward for jobs because they thought he couldn't read or write. DH bit his tongue because if he'd have told them what he thought he would have had his JSA stopped. That week he found three cleaning jobs on his own each for a few hours but it was work and paid more than JSA.

My uncle retired early from a very senior post in the civil service early. When he was settled in his new home he went down to the job centre to look for a job because his pension was quite limited until he was 60.

He was told very brusquely that they, effectively had no jobs for the likes of him. He pointed out that the local shoe factory was looking for operatives. They were absolutely horrified that a man who had held a senior management position would be prepared to work in a factory. My uncle got a job in the factory and worked on the assembly line there until it closed down 5 years later.

If this is how it is for articulate people who can speak for themselves and can access other sources to find out their rights, just how on earth do less able people manage? Maybe a few MPs could go and register at their local job centre when they lose their seats in May next year, and get an idea of the humiliation and degradation involved in asking for help from a system which we have been paying into for years. Whenever I register a job on the job centre website I get inundated with applications, many of whom obviously haven't read the job description and are not going to be suitable ( i am not specific about experience or anything like that, but applicants must have a driving licence) I asked one interviewee why this was and she told me that she had been instructed to apply for a minimum of 40 jobs a week or her JSA would be stopped, therefore she had applied for hundreds of jobs from lorry driver to slaughterman despite looking for an admin position within school hours. This whole system is a failure, both for job seekers and employers; I have offered many interviews to candidates who seem to be what I am looking for and many, if not most, fail to attend the booked interview. It is all just window dressing and a complete nonsense.

When I was made redundant 11 years ago I went to sign on - don't think JSA was means-tested then - mainly so my National Insurance wouldn't be affected.

In the ensuing 6 weeks or so I went on a couple of rubbish seminars and training days. One of them was supposedly a computer-package course - I left at lunchtime when the chap who was 'tutoring' me (just him and me in the class) told me that HTML stood for Hotmail.

Seems not much has changed in terms of quality.

I have to say that my experience of my local Jobcentre was a very positive one, and the staff were helpful and supportive, but it does seem that is the exception unfortunately.

But did they ever find you a job phoenix?

A friend's husband worked at a Job Centre for 25 years then he had a major back injury and became disabled to the point where he could no longer work. He suddenly found himself on the other side of the benefits fence and was treated appallingly even by people he'd previously worked with. He hadn't realised how 'us and them' it was until he suddenly became 'them' rather than 'us'.

He finally got his benefits sorted out but felt it was only because he knew the system inside out. If he'd been an ordinary person he wouldn't have got his entitlements.

Luckily I have just heard that I have been accepted on a Return to Nursing course starting in January, so once I get my UKCC PIN back, I can return to working in the NHS.
My last job was as a high level manager in the voluntary sector; told job centre I was prepared to do any job and response was 'you're too highly qualified for most jobs!'
Goodness knows how depressing it must be for the long term unemployed. Am still struggling to comprehend the attitudes of those supposedly helping the job seekers to return to work.

I do not think many MPs will have to go to the jobcentre, GillT, unfortunately. They get an allowance of 1 month's pay for each year they have been in parliament, and £44,000 to close down their offices. So someone who loses his or her seat after only five years will get nearly £28,000. I think that is twice statutory redundancy pay for anyone else.

Good luck, loopylou. Working in the NHS these days? You're brave.

Good luck with the course loopy.

I did it 10 years' ago, after a gap of 17 years - best thing I ever did.

By the way, UKCC is now NMC!

Job centre staff seem to be undertrained to me.

One hour a week is ludicrous.
Having said that, I dont know about anyone else on gransnet, but I dont think I know anyone who is unemployed at the moment.

I know lots of people who are unemployed and desperately seeking work. I also know people on zero hour contracts which means they never know from one week to the next when/if they will work and what, if anything, they will earn.

Same here, vampire.
Where do you live, soontobe?
Vampire and I are up North.

I live just outside Chester and I can't think of anyone I know that isn't working, that is of course if they want to work. I think a lot of people who are unemployed need to lower their expectations a little.

South durhamjen.
But it is an area that is eligible for EU money, so that may be what is making the difference lately.

Sorry for the delay in responding, but no River they didn't! However they were realistic (to a degree) in steering me away from jobs.

If I might explain, at the time a supermarket was advertising for staff, I mentioned this to the Jobcentre advisor and she shook her head, because she understood that I might be offered (for example) 4 hour shifts, which taking into account the distance I would have to travel (by car, no bus route) meant that financially it wouldn't have been a sensible option.

This contrasts with other peoples experiences where the staff encourage you to take anything, just because it will take you off the list and make their figures look better.

Hope this makes sense!

PS Meant to add, that the staff knew that I was taking every step possible to find a job, so there was nothing that they could have found for me to apply for that I hadn't already found for myself.

In all fairness to them, some of the people that I saw there on my signing on days seemed to have little or no interest in actually getting a job, which must surely make the staff a bit miffed to say the least!

soontobe I know one person who is unemployed and unfortunately lives in a part of the country where any job is scarce. I am ever hopeful that person will be successful very soon.

I hope they are too Charleygirl.

This drags in ATOS I'm afraid, but when DH was off sick about 6 years ago he had to go for one of their assessments. He had a torn rotator cuff which meant he couldn't use his left arm and couldn't drive his HGV or work unloading lorries. Everything they did was geared towards proving he was fit to find a job. What they refused to understand was that he HAD a job, he was NOT unemployed, he just needed money when his sick pay ran out while he recovered enough to drive again.

It's strange how everybody says the unemployed should get themselves jobs. In fact only 0.7% of the government's spending is on unemployment.
The unemployed should lower their expectations to what, exactly, Ceesnan?
A zero hours or minimum wage contract? 4 times as much money is spent on bolstering the low pay economy than on unemployment benefit.

Thanks Riverwalk, really looking forward to the course and nursing again. I was very actively looking at any job (am main breadwinner), and definitely not a high level manager's post, whilst awaiting the outcome of the application to return to practice.
I think it's the attitude of the staff at the Job Centre that shocked me so much, hopefully not endemic in that organisation.
Like Phoenix, I would have been surprised if they'd found a job I hadn't already seen, I spent hours on the Internet.