Introduced in 2013, Universal Credit has been helping families and individuals in the United Kingdom as a social security benefit that came in to replace six tax credits and benefits. The benefits that were replaced include the
- Child Tax Credit,
- Jobseeker’s Allowance,
- Housing Benefit,
- Income Support,
- Working Tax Credit, and
- Employment and Support Allowance.
This was part of a number of welfare reforms introduced between 2010-2015. The focus of the reforms is to help users to access better service in the management of social security features.
Payment Period and Payments Merger
One of the things the reforms of Universal Credit brought is the merger of the above-mentioned benefits with the intention to consolidate the payouts to users. Instead of remitting the individual payouts fortnightly, this will be done once after every month.
You basically get a single universal credit payment. The money will then go directly to the bank account and if you and your spouse are both receiving the benefits, you can choose to get one payment for a household, which makes things easier and convenient to process.
Additionally, for those who have assistance paying rent, money will be included in your benefit instead of being sent to your landlord. You can then pay your landlord after you have received the money.
It is not the most suitable way of dealing with the benefits but it at least eases many things for you and ensures a colossal sum so that you can plan your weeks better.
Access Everything Online
Everything you need is accessible online. You will simply need access to the internet. You can access the service from the local council and job center if you lack access to the Internet.
Many people still have questions about the reliability of the online system while accessing Universal Credit and one of the concerns is whether it can cope with the high number of claims.
But so far it has proved to work smoothly since it’s backed by efficient technology that supports millions of transactions. There are still improvements that must be made in order to stabilize the whole system, so there is still some work before it meets the expectations of the majority of users.
A Win for Families
According to an estimation, 3.1 million households would be entitled to receive more benefits through the Universal Credit arrangement. In the same statement, at least 2.8 million households would see some reduction in the total amount received.
Many people are still struggling to understand how it works and therefore you will see a lot of claims and inquiries. If you are experiencing any problems, you should seek assistance from Universal Credit to understand how your allocations are calculated and whether there are errors that could be causing the shift.
Universal Credit has brought a new solution to the management of welfare benefits, so if you would like to know it could help you contact universal credit. Their focus is on consolidation to ease payments and ensure households receive a lump sum instead of the different payments made from different channels.
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