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Author Topic: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS  (Read 7457 times)

Colin Bishop

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #25 on: February 25, 2010, 04:47:13 pm »

Quote
I think it should be related to the actual weather by virtue of actual location. It is ridiculous to pay the same in London as the top of a Yorkshire hill. Even half a mile can make a difference and relating address to exposure is not difficult.

That sounds a mite unrealistic to me - how would you apply it to several million people without massive additional bureaucracy? Would you allow for a house facing south to get less because it catches the sun better, unless of course it is overshadowed by another building. Would you take into account the degree of insulation in different properties? An old Victorian terrace in London with just a back burner could well be colder in winter than a modern bungalow in Yorkshire with triple glazing, a foot of loft insulation and a condensing boiler. Apples and pears I think.

Colin
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Patternmaker

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #26 on: February 25, 2010, 05:58:53 pm »

Information from DWP

When are Cold Weather Payments made?
Cold Weather Payments are made when the average temperature for your area is recorded as 0° Celsius (freezing point) or below over seven consecutive days. They are also made when the Meteorological Office forecasts such a spell of cold weather



Who can get Cold Weather Payments?You are eligible for a Cold Weather Payment if you get one of the following benefits

Income Support
Employment and Support Allowance (income-related)
income-based Jobseeker's Allowance
Pension Credit
If you get Income Support, Employment and Support Allowance (income-related) during the assessment phase or income-based Jobseeker's Allowance, you must also receive a pensioner or disability premium or have a child who is disabled or under the age of 5.

Do any savings you have affect the payment?
No. Savings do not affect Cold Weather Payments.



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Perkasaman2

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #27 on: February 25, 2010, 09:44:19 pm »

I missed qualifying for WFP this winter  by a matter of days. 
Colin, I spent 30 years in various forms of Government employ plus 14 years as self employed/employer... The classical art of sophistry continues to thrive and has found new adherents in the banking industry also........ It's amazing how every insurance broker in the UK now knows when my car insurance etc. is due, in fact I now rely on them to remind me ..........senior moments.  %)
Apologies to ALLl mayhemmers, I still have'nt got the hang of this 'quote thingy'  :embarrassed: {:-{

Any software suggestions for 'dictation to puter screen' ( accent proof)?? 
A hammer/chisel on stone might be easier than my key tapping drudgery. :-)
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Colin Bishop

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #28 on: February 25, 2010, 10:22:55 pm »

Perkasaman,

I don't totally disagree with your comments but I think that, as written, they were a little unfair. I too have spent my career in the public sector (local government) with very close contact with the private sector over the final 15 years when many services were transferred. From my personal observation there is little to choose between the competence of the public and private sector. There are good people and plonkers on both sides in equal measure. I think there are two areas where things have come badly unstuck. One is the practice of parachuting senior managers into the public from the private sector on inflated salaries. These 'professional managers', as you quite rightly term them, have little practical experience in the areas they are expected to manage and frequently flounder and often make things worse rather than better from an addiction to radical change when an evolutionary approach would have yielded more effective results.

The second problem is outsourcing things willy nilly and irrespective whether that is the right solution. Sometimes outsourcing can bring benefits by tapping into private sector expertise and economies of scale and I have no problems with that. In other instances you may just get a cheaper service and a reduction in standards to match or worse. A classic example is the outsourcing of cleaning in hospitals. When the service was 'in house' the cleaners identified with the organisation which engendered a feeling of being part of the team and reinforced the imperative to do a good job. Once cleaning was outsourced you just had agency staff, frequently on short term appointments, and who naturally felt no real responsibility or loyalty to either their employers or the workplace to which they had been assigned. Cheaper maybe, but service standards slipped to an unacceptable level. The report on Stafford hospital in the last couple of days is an extreme example of cost cutting at the expense of service standards by 'professional managers'.

Much of the problem is managerial dysfunctionality at the top level aided and abetted by incompetent politicians looking for a quick fix. Middle managers such as myself found this every bit as frustrating as do the the general public.

Colin

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FullLeatherJacket

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #29 on: February 26, 2010, 08:44:04 am »

Colin
I wish I could say that you took the words out of my mouth. And I thought it was just me that saw things like that......
Thanks for your considered and measured reply - far more eloquent than the rantings of the Red Tops and those nasty little 'journalistas' on the Beeb.
FLJ
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malcolmfrary

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #30 on: February 26, 2010, 12:38:32 pm »

I'd forgotten about this allowance - amazing, I get reminders for just about everything that I pay out in life, but no one tells me my entitlements now I'm 60! -------------- how do I claim? might even go for a bus pass as well!
                                           Tony.

For the government stuff, have a look at
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Diol1/DoItOnline/DoItOnlineByCategory/DG_172666??cid=fywbtw_2&type=sponsoredsearch&cre=search
For your wrinkly bus pass you will likely need a trip to your town hall.  I was dealt with by a very nice lady who had just had a very trying quarter of an hour explaining to a guy that is he was coming in about somebody else's pass, he should at least have brought a picture.  She said it would arrive "within 5 working days".  It dropped through my letterbox the morning after.
There seems to have been some confusion between Winter Fuel Payment and the Cold Weather Allowance - two different benefits probably dealt with by different departments and working to different rules.
About outsourcing services like cleaning - when the cleaners were directly employed, they invariably were part of the team, and behaved as such, both in conduct and flexibility of working.  When the cleaners became contractors, it was noticeable that the companies doing the contracting employed very well qualified and astute people to read contracts very, very carefully to ensure that absolutely nothing was done that was not explicitly being paid for.  In my main employment, there were security considerations, and everybody, cleaners included, was subject to vetting and the signing of the Official Secrets Act.  The contractors who turned up were an interesting bunch, to say the least.
Professional Managers were generally fairly useless, occasionally dangerously so, but very good at shifting the blame having talked themselves into a job they knew they couldn't do in the first place.  Direct Entry managers, with brand new degrees, invariably started off being useless, but could usually be made into something fairly useful if they were prepared to do about 18 months of learning.
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"With the right tool, you can break anything" - Garfield

PMK

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #31 on: February 26, 2010, 01:33:09 pm »

"There seems to have been some confusion between Winter Fuel Payment and the Cold Weather Allowance - two different benefits..."

Ah, so there is a difference. Thanks for that, MalcF.
Me, because of because, I now get a few shillings from the Gov't and I just assumed that the monies are for paying bills such as heating anyway. I didn't realise that they were also giving away £25.00 on top of. It's hardly any wonder that the politicians are whinging of being skint all the time; one minute they're banging-on about recessions, and the next they're giving it away like it's going out of fashion.
Geez!
Seems that our pensioners are on a pretty good thing already, financial-wise, therefore our RNLI are gonna be fifty quid better off this week.
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Patternmaker

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #32 on: February 26, 2010, 03:37:31 pm »

"There seems to have been some confusion between Winter Fuel Payment and the Cold Weather Allowance - two different benefits..."

Ah, so there is a difference. Thanks for that, MalcF.
Me, because of because, I now get a few shillings from the Gov't and I just assumed that the monies are for paying bills such as heating anyway. I didn't realise that they were also giving away £25.00 on top of. It's hardly any wonder that the politicians are whinging of being skint all the time; one minute they're banging-on about recessions, and the next they're giving it away like it's going out of fashion.
Geez!
Seems that our pensioners are on a pretty good thing already, financial-wise, therefore our RNLI are gonna be fifty quid better off this week.




So you think pensioners are on pretty good thing do you, I hope when you are become a pensioner you will still think so.
and manage to live on £166.00 a week
I personally have worked all my life never once been unemployed from the day I left school, apart from National Service,
paid into a private pension for years so when I retired I could pay of the mortgage, yes I do own my house if anything happens to me or my wife and the one left has to go into care the house will be sold to pay for the care.

So there you have it PMK and it is 60 NOT 65

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PMK

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #33 on: February 26, 2010, 04:13:29 pm »

Tsk', tsk'.... a bit tetchy, aren't we?
Did my scribes really come across as having a poke at our pensioners? Or are you simply one of those that automatically jump to negative conclusions?
Lighten up, man. Nobody is having a poke at you or anyone - particularly pensioners.
Read thru once again, then see it for what it really is.

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PMK

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #34 on: February 27, 2010, 01:29:57 am »

Pardon me for causing the moderator's to jump in. My apologies for the previous (moderated) comments.
But when I talk of our pensioners' being financially well off, I simply meant that pensioners in general seem to be enjoying a reasonably comfortable means of living nowadays -- especially when you compare it with how rough the general pensioner population had it in years gone by. I'm not saying that all pensioners are financially loaded by any means. I'm realistic enough to appreciate that some older folk don't even have the means to scrape two pennies together - let alone live a life of Riley. But, all in all, British pensioners, and rightly so, are these days now able to enjoy a reasonably healthy lifestyle.
I'm basing this upon the fact that my old lady, already a pensioner, living on her own, and in receipt of state welfare, would be the first to admit that she is now more financially secure than she's ever been. Admittedly, she does now qualify for rent-free accommodation, but there is no way she can eat £166.00's-worth of groceries ever week. Basically, the monies left over is hers to do as she wish.
So I reckon that when, or indeed, if I should be lucky enough to reach pensionable age, then yes - I reckon it should be possible for everyone to live just as comfortable as our present-day pensioners. I guess it all depends on what we define as our minimum needs... or greeds. Some folk need absolute wads of £££ just to survive each day, whereas some don't.
And probably much healthier all round if we all all started thanking our government and their - albeit quirky - welfare system and at least be grateful for small mercies, rather than stirring up agro and complaining about a measly few thousand expatriates who are just as much entitled to their WFPs as anyone else anyway.
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funtimefrankie

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #35 on: February 27, 2010, 10:26:06 am »

If anyone who doesn't feel they want their winter fuel allowance, could they claim it and pass it on to me.... thanks :-))
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Patternmaker

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #36 on: February 27, 2010, 02:03:22 pm »

PMK apology accepted,
I would like to point out that the figure of £166.00 is for 2 people, we do not eat our way through all of that, the remainder has to pay all the bills; council tax, gas, electricity, water, insurance etc.
This is why the Winter Fuel Allowance is very helpful to me and most pensioners.
The government stipulates what a couple need to live on; if you do not qualify for a full basic pension it is made up with pension credit.

In order to qualify for a full basic pension you need 44 qualifying years of National Insurance contributions, from April this year you will only need 30 qualifying years.

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regiment

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #37 on: February 27, 2010, 03:00:18 pm »

yes some of us pensioners are well off my wife and i get the state pention also i get a service one 22 yrs raf  we also get fuel allc bus pass tv licence not forgetting  reduced rent and poll tax plus next dec my extra 25 p for being 80 yrs  yes we are the lucky ones
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PMK

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #38 on: February 28, 2010, 06:48:43 am »

To be totally honest, I really do not have the foggiest idea of how much my old momma receives in State Pension. When you mentioned £166.00 I just assumed that £166.00 is the amount that every pensioner receives. Since she's now widowed, it's likely that she may indeed receive a tad less. However, I failed to mention that she is also exempt from the dreaded Poll Tax. So even if she does receive less than £166.00, the situation for her is that she is still far more comfortable than she would be if she was still working -- and not forgetting all her free NHS treatment and medications.
You're right, it's not an ideal system by any means. But if you weigh up all the pros and cons, take into account all the monies that each of us has ploughed into the coffers over the years, then, basically, we are now a nation of Kings and Queens... Which is probably the reason why so many foreigners are trying their hardest to get to these shores anyway.
And who can blame them?
Perhaps another argument altogether, to save for another rainy day.
Besides, today is the Sabbath. My one and only argument-free day.  8)

F_T_Frank,
Word on the street is that you have changed your surname to RNLI.
In that case, Mr RNLI, fifty green 'uns will be winging their way to you on the morrow.
Don't spend it on fags, beer or drugs.
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Patternmaker

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #39 on: February 28, 2010, 09:01:55 am »



The State Pension is made up of Basic State Pension and State Second Pension.

The amount of basic State Pension you will receive when you reach State Pension age depends on the number of years you have paid or been treated as paying National Insurance contributions. The full basic State Pension for 2008/09 is £90.70 per week for a single person. If a couple have both paid full National Insurance contributions they will both be entitled to the single person's amount. If not the payment for a pensioner couple is £145.05 per week (2008/09). You may also be entitled to additional benefits from the State, for example pensions and/or housing credit, etc.

You can claim your State Pension when you reach State Pension age. This is 65 for men and, currently, 60 for women. the retirement age for women will gradually increase from 2010 to reach 65 in 2020.

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FullLeatherJacket

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #40 on: February 28, 2010, 12:38:54 pm »

The State Pension is made up of Basic State Pension and State Second Pension. ...........................This is 65 for men and, currently, 60 for women. the retirement age for women will gradually increase from 2010 to reach 65 in 2020.

All very impressive, I'm sure - but entitlement to this or that pension has little or nothing to do with Winter Fuel Payments (which we have already established are payable at age 60 blah blah). Could I ask that if you wish to add to the collective wisdom of the Forum then could you refrain from simply quoting great slabs of dull facts and figures from HMG's websites?  A straightforward link would suffice; life's too short as it is.
FLJ
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Patternmaker

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Re: WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS
« Reply #41 on: February 28, 2010, 12:52:46 pm »

All this information was for PMKs benefit, if you read his posts, sorry if I'm boring you.
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