Quiet day. I had my second phone appointment for Universal Credit. It was to advise me about working when self employed during the CoronaVirus. Once I explained that once the tennis tours start up again I will be back in business and so didn’t need advice on finding a job.
You have to feel for all those who left it later than I did to apply or whose jobs have only just shut down or ended. I spent a lot of time on hold when trying to get through on the phones. Probably something like 10 hours in total but that is nothing compared to the queues now. People are finding themselves in queues of well over 100,000 and I’m sure I saw a screenshot of over 200,000. I’m not sure if that was for the Universal Credit line or for the ID verification services but both have gone into meltdown. The stress must be intense.
Apparently you can now request the first appointment via your Universal Credit account page. I had asked if that was possible when I was applying but never had a response.
Self employed people will find out on Thursday what payments they can expect to receive.
Last night I was very impressed to see everyone staying in round here. It felt like people were really starting to take the soft lockdown seriously. To be fair it seems to be a smallish minority who think they can ignore instructions. Someone was moving house from one end of the street to the other this afternoon. A group of their mates were carrying their stuff between the 2 houses. The local drug dealer (well one of them) was still working. I can just see one of the designated drop off points from my desk. At least he won’t have the stress of applying for Universal Credit.
I hadn’t been in the Skype room for a few days so went in there this morning. There hadn’t been much activity. I asked how everyone was doing and quite a few responded and there was some general chat about things in general and obviously about the CoronaVirus. A bit of social interaction was nice even if it was on line.It’s only been 2 days of lockdown! God help us after 2 months or more.
I’ll be taking the dogs out later. Hopefully it will be quiet again but if not I’ll dig out the body cam. Might be an interesting addition to the diary! Although when I have worn it for dog walks in the past sod all ever happened. Either that or if something DID happen it was too far away for the body cam to pick up.
That was about it for today other than a few tweaks to the websites. I’ll get back to the videos tomorrow.
Stay safe.
