Rent supplement/Jobseekers Allowance problem

joannaman

Hi there,

I'm unemployed and getting jobseekers allowance and rent supplement for myself and my wife, who is studying a full-time post-graduate course. Now I just found out over the Christmas that she has been doing a couple of hours tutoring in the college as part of her course since last September. Not much money involved - €30 per hour, 1 hour 2 days a week, so she got paid €60 per week, 10 weeks in total. I'm going to tell my local office in the next couple of days but could anyone tell me how much they will dock from my dole and whether I need to tell the Rent Supplement officer as well?

Thanks for any help.

misan9

I'm not 100% certain but I think they will deduct 2 days. The dole is based on a 6 day week now so if you are getting E188 that is E62.67.

However I think that you are not allowed to claim rent allowance if you have a part time job. My advice is don't tell them at all.

RealistSpy

You can claim rent allowance if you have a part time job but not full time.
Honesty is the best, just tell them. They won't deduct much from you anyway.

amtw

From looking up the rules on www.welfare.ie it doesn't appear that the amount of money that your partner earned will affect your Rent Supplement. So you really should contact your CWO and tell them that she was working and how much she earned.

"Additional Income Disregard

The "additional income disregard" refers to the amount of additional income from certain sources, over and above the appropriate SWA rate, that can be disregarded in the means test for Rent Supplement purposes.
The 'additional income disregard' was introduced with effect from 6th June 2007 as follows:

• Disregard the first €75 of "additional income"
• Disregard 25% of "additional income" over €75
• There is no upper limit on the amount that can be disregarded

The "additional income" is the amount of income in excess of the SWA rate, applicable to household circumstances and includes income derived from:

• Part time employment or part time self employment (under 30 hours per week)"

joannaman

Thanks for the replies. I'll go and have a chat with them and hopefully there won't be too much of an issue.