Jobseekers and part time childminding

JBoyle4eva

Hi all, this in relation to my mother here. She had been a childminder for several years uptil last year, when the business started to become a loss maker and it wasn't viable to keep it going. After some time, my mum became eligible for job seekers.

She's been on it ever since, with no employment or children coming into the home. However, a friend of ours (also on job seekers as a casual worker working on three days out of seven) is looking into getting my mum to take her two children on, paying a small sum of €50 for two days as her husband works full time as of recently, hence needing a childminder.

Now both want to stay legitimate to the system, with my mum hoping to retain most of her welfare and the mother looking to keep hers too plus the medical card her family has.

However, what seems to be very off putting is information the friend has received. She contacted her welfare office and they said if she wishes to pay €50 p/week to my mother she would need to be reassessed for her medical card and job seekers and be liable to lose one or both. However, my mum would just be counted as a part-time jobseeker.

Now, I find it very hard to believe that paying my mum €50 per week would lead to such benefits to be removed from her. As it stands, with her husband now working, they need a childminder for both of them to stay in work. And my mum usually would charge €100 p/week, but if she did she'd be losing more from jobseekers. Leading to charging only €50.

As such, is it true that the potential parent would lose out so much? Seems awful harsh and, well, stupid.

StillWaters

I think you might have the wrong end of the stick. Her medical card and JSA will be reviewed in light of her partner working. Childcare fees are actually counted as an expense for medical card purposes.

Would your mother consider the enterprise allowance, and building up her childminding business again? She would retain her jobseekers for 12 months.