Big changes to the Benefits system

This morning I had to go to a workshop run by Jobcentre Plus. It was being held in a hired out room in M&S. The start time was 9.45am and they said to go to M&S and head for the cafe.
It turned out though that the actual room they were using was down in the basement of the store so the Jobcentre staff had to hover around the stairs/lifts/escalators so that we could find them.

There were meant to be 20 other lone parents on the workshop but by 10am there were only 5 of us but they couldn't wait any longer. (I have to say it is no wonder some people are still out of work - several people arrived 30 minutes late and more arrived later still with 2 people arriving just as they were finishing!)

The major changes I am about to face are that because DS is over 12, come October I will switch from Income support to Jobseekers. So the main purpose was to let us know about the changes and make it clear that is more important than ever to get into work before October.
Well Yes of course it is but don't they think we have been trying????

There are actually more levels of support than ever before too. There are several back to work benefits and they offer a after care service too so that once you are on work you are still on their books for 6 months so that if things aren't working out you still have someone to talk to. If only they had that when I got the job at PoundPlus all those years ago. If they had been able to help me out I might have stayed there.

A guy from a training centre came to give us a talk too. He does a course called Goals which runs for 2 days. It kind of covers the stuff I did at TBG for getting back into work but I think I will still sign up. Its all expenses paid plus a free lunch lol!

There was also a talk from the HR woman at Marks but I didn't see the point in that. For one she told us the hours aren't really child friendly (Early mornings/late nights) and she also said that they have waiting lists of possible employees so it is hard to get a job there.

The event lasted 2 hours as they said it would and I came away non the wiser really but I have to get my act together before I have to start signing on again.