Life on Universal Credit: I was threatened with a sanction after missing a Jobcentre meeting when my girlfriend miscarried Kye, from Somerset, said the incident left him stressed and upset

In this series, i reveals how the controversial Universal Credit system is affecting the lives of people up and down the UK through emotional and financial stress.

Kye has been working as a chef for more than 11 years. But earlier this year he had to take some time off to get counselling for depression and anxiety.

He signed on to Universal Credit to cover his rent and living costs while he got the help he so desperately needed. But he didn’t realise how difficult his life would become under Universal Credit.

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The controversial new benefits system left him with just £30 to live on each month after paying his rent. He has racked up debt and has had to turn to his friends for help.

Feels like being ‘punished’

Kye, who didn’t want i to use his last name, says it feels like he is being “punished” for being unwell and needing some time off temporarily.

“I do want to work. I’ll work for 65 years of my life so if I have to take six months off to get myself better then why not? At the same time I don’t expect to live off so little a month and I don’t expect to be put in debt because of it. I didn’t ask for that. I just asked for some help,” says the 28-year-old.

Kye, who lives in Somerset but is originally from Scunthorpe, tells i he has also been left distressed because of an encounter with a member of Jobcentre staff.

His girlfriend had a miscarriage earlier this month and so he had to miss an appointment at the Jobcentre to discuss a payment issue. To his shock, he was told there was a chance he could be sanctioned. Kye later found out he could not be sanctioned for missing this kind of appointment – but that’s not the point, he says.

“I was so stressed and upset… Why was it mentioned? If you can’t get sanctioned then why put me under the stress of thinking I was going to get [a sanction]?”

Signing on to Universal Credit

Kye had to stop working earlier this year because of a series of health issues.

“I found out in February that I had ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) at 27. I had anxiety and depression as well. I’d just had a few bereavements in the family… Over time I just started struggling.”

His doctor advised him to attend counselling sessions multiple times a week and prescribed him with medication. The doctor wanted Kye to focus on his mental health and well-being, rather than work, for a while.

“As you can imagine, chef work does require a lot of your time. The best thing for me [was] to have a bit of time off work. It’s been a two year thing with the depression, they wanted me to take some good time off and just get it sorted. That’s why I had to go on Universal Credit because I had to get support for my housing.”

Kye received £584 from Universal Credit but after paying his rent of £555, he was left with less than £30 for the month. An attempt to get a discretionary housing payment from his local council was unsuccessful. Out of what little he had left, he also had to pay a friend whom he owes money.

‘I do want to work. I’ll work for 65 years of my life so if I have to take six months off to get myself better then why not? At the same time I don’t expect to live off so little a month and I don’t expect to be put in debt because of it.’ Kye

Sometimes he was left with just £15 to cover his bills and living costs for the month.

‘Begging and borrowing’

He resorted to “begging and borrowing”.

“I’ve had to rely on friends, to the point where some have got annoyed about it. Everyone has got their own stuff going on.”

Kye is not alone in struggling to get by on Universal Credit, which combines six benefits into one monthly payment. Other claimants have said they have had to wait too long for their first payment while some have said the amount they get is simply not enough to cover the costs of living and housing. Many have resorted to using food banks to tide them over until their next payment. But Kye rejected food bank vouchers.

“Last year I could afford my own food. For me it’s embarrassing having to go somewhere to get food. In terms of the depression, it makes you feel useless. It’s a vicious circle.

“You go from earning £20,000 a year to earning £500 a month. And it’s not earnings, it literally goes to someone else.”

His experience as a chef has meant Kye managed to make what little food he could buy go further.

“Because I’m a chef, I’m very good with food. I’ll buy a bag of 95 pence new potatoes. I’m quite trained so I could put a little bit of bacon and stuff in there and make myself little stuffed potatoes. If I wasn’t a chef I don’t think I would have been able to cook food so cheaply. Because of that experience I have been able to save myself money. I’ll go to the shop at 9pm and get a baguette for 15 pence because it’s going out of date.”

‘Livid’

After three months on Universal Credit, Kye managed to get a seasonal job from August until the end of October. Because of his earnings, he didn’t receive Universal Credit in November, meaning he had to go weeks without any money after his job ended.

However Kye believes the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) overestimated his earnings during the one-month assessment period until his November payment date. He arranged a meeting to discuss this at the Jobcentre on 5 December.

The evening before, his girlfriend, who was seven weeks pregnant, had a miscarriage. He rang up the Jobcentre helpline to say he couldn’t attend the meeting but was left “livid” at the response.

“I don’t drive and my Jobcentre is 18 miles away from where I live. As we’d been in the hospital, [my girlfriend] was defeated, she wanted to go to bed, she was tried. I couldn’t ask her to drive me 18 miles that day. But I didn’t have money to get on the bus.

‘My emotions were running high. It had been a really crap 24 hours for me and my partner so I did react probably not in the best way.’ Kye

“I rang up the phone line at the Jobcentre, spoke to a lady and explained what had happened. She said: ‘You need to check your [online] journal in the next few days to see if you’ve been sanctioned [for missing the meeting].’

“My emotions were running high. It had been a really crap 24 hours for me and my partner so I did react probably not in the best way. I just said: ‘I think that’s bullshit. You can’t sanction me for my girlfriend having a miscarriage, I didn’t know this was going to happen.’ I said: ‘I live 18 miles away, I can’t drive or afford to get there on the bus, what do you expect me to do, jog?’ Then she literally just went, ‘thank you for your call’ and hung up the phone. I won’t lie I was livid.”

What are sanctions? Universal Credit claimants can have their payment reduced for a set period of time – known as sanctions – if it is deemed they have failed to meet pre-agreed work-related commitments. Missing or being late to appointments at the Jobcentre can lead to sanctions.

Kye complained to the DWP and contacted his local MP, whose caseworker found out that he could not be sanctioned for missing a meeting of this kind.

But Kye maintains it caused him unnecessary stress and upset. He cannot understand why the word “sanction” was even mentioned.

Trying to get back into work

His experience on Universal Credit meant that Kye, understandably, had been keen to get back into work. Shortly before the incident with the Jobcentre he had managed to find a full-time job. “I wanted the situation to stop and I wanted to stop struggling. I thought I’d go back to work full time and I’ll earn good money like I did before,” he says.

Even though he had secured work, he was still dealing with the pressures of debt and rent arrears after missing some payments. He was also grieving after the miscarriage. Kye had his first ever panic attack. His doctor signed him off work again and said the panic attack was brought on because he “had too much to cope with at once”.

Kye will now have to delay going back to work for another month and has signed on to Universal Credit again.

While he thinks Universal Credit is a good idea for getting people into work, it does not always help in cases like his.

“It makes me feel useless and crap. Mentally I just feel crap about myself. I don’t how to explain it better than that. I want to work but I just need to do this for me now, so that I’ll be better in the long term. But it feels like I’m being punished because I’m sick,” he says.

The DWP said: “[Kye] has not been sanctioned and Jobcentre staff have considered his personal circumstances when setting up his new Universal Credit claim. [Kye] has received an advance payment and has been offered budgeting support.”

If you would like to help people on Universal Credit, please contact Crisis or The Trussell Trust

If you would like to share your experience about life on Universal Credit, email serina.sandhu@inews.co.uk

Read more in our Life On Universal Credit series.