Reject job offer on social welfare

LegacyUser

Hoping someone here can help and advise, I'm currently near the end of a jobbridge internship, and there more or less is an offer of a job after in the form of a 3 month contract. However the issue is this, I really have little interest in working for the company long term for various reasons, don't like the work, the company is small and little chance of moving up, the company is struggling-other staff have had delays in their pay, the offer was for quite a low amount 16.5k. Now given all this I was planning on taking the job but looking hard for a job elsewhere however something else has come to light.

I am eligible for the JobsPlus program which will pay a company 10k over 2 years if they offer me full time employment. Now aside from the fact that this makes the pay offer even worse looking I would much rather try to use this incentive to help enable me to get a better job and one that in the long term would serve me better.

So my question is this, can I reject this job offer and still be entitled to my social welfare payment. I do realize how bad it sounds to turn down a job offer to remain on social welfare but given the circumstance I really would much rather the incentive be used better.

mrsbyrne

If you are being offered a job and you don't take it then your not looking for work or available for work so you cant get a Jobseekers payment. If you go back to Sw they will send a form to your current employer asking them why you left. When the employer says that they offered you a position and you refused it you will be disqualified.

Immaculata

Agree with MrsByrne.

Well done for putting in the graft unpaid on a JobBridge placement.

I realise the job offer mightn't be ideal, but maybe you could negotiate? If the place where you're interning does offer you a three month contract, before you accept, go to your supervisor or HR and tell them about the incentive, point out what a good intern you have been, and maybe you and they can agree a full-time job with a better rate of pay and/or better conditions? That way everyone wins. Although I would suggest that you check the JobsPlus terms and conditions carefully to see what you're committing yourself to in that regard.

Alternatively, you might want to call the INOU (inou.ie) and enquire whether a company that has had trouble paying its staff really qualifies as a body capable of making a solid acceptable job offer and whether you could then use that as grounds for refusing their offer of a three month contract without losing your SW.

Another, more Trainspotting-influenced, more challenging, approach would be to ensure that the place where you're interning doesn't want to offer you a contract at the end of your internship. So then you're free to go looking for a better option with the JobsPlus incentive as an additional boost to your prospects with a better employer. If you quite understandably aren't going to be happy working at the internship place for the reasons you mentioned, you're not going to be the best fit for that company anyway, so they'd be better off with someone else and you'd be better off elsewhere.

Good luck whatever you decide.