I don't want to spend half the day navigating the phone menu, then hanging on hold listening to on-hold music that induces suicidal (and/or homicidal) thoughts. I don't want to spend money on an 0845 call when the bulk of my time will be spent navigating the menu and being on hold - and I'm poor anyway so I don't like spending money fullstop. What I'd like to do is send in an email query that they can respond to at their leisure. But can I contact the Job Centre by email? Hint... they say I can...
You try it. The address is http://www.jobcentreplus.gov.uk
You click on contacts and it takes you to a page with a range of options. But these more or less all lead to the FAQ page or to forms for benefits claims. And even though the text says that you'll be able to contact them, and that they do not guarantee to answer all emails - THERE IS NO FUCKING EMAIL ADDRESS! So what the fuck are they talking about? Unlike many other government agencies which allow me to send in non-urgent queries that they can take their time answering, they want me to tie up a phone line and end up suicidal.
If I want to complain about this? I can phone them on the 0845 no. "Or you can write a letter and post it, email it, fax it or hand it in to us at your nearest Jobcentre." Except... THERE IS NO FUCKING EMAIL ADDRESS! (Or fax no for that matter). Basically despite everything they say you have three options - pay to phone them and end up suicidal; snail-mail it, or go to see them in person. Going in person is also probably half a day for a 5 minute answer. And it means standing around waiting for an appointment because half the time there is not enough seating, and the seating make my back ache anyway.
I give up at this point. Maybe another day when I have a bit more patience. Or maybe I'll spend an hour outside in sub-zero temperatures waiting for the CAB to open because if you don't get there well before they open your chances of being seen within the few hours they are open are negligible - freeze for an hour, or spend the whole day listening to commercial radio (thinking about slashing my wrists) and sitting on chairs that seem to be designed for the purposes of torture, with a distinct possibility that they'll run out of time and you'll have to come back the next day and queue again.
Fuck. Today seems to be one of those "everything is hard" days. Wonder if I have any valium left over...?
3 comments:
"You try it. The address is http://www.jobcentreplus.gov.uk"
I tried it. I clicked on contacts and it took me to a page with a range of options, just like you said. As you also said, these more or less all lead to the FAQ page or to forms for benefits claims BUT look at the red "SitePlus" menu to the right. Near the boittom of this menu you'll find a link headed "Contact us". This takes you to a page where are required to enter your full postcode. Enter that and you'll get a page containing full details of your local benefit office - title, address and telephone number. And underneath it all is another link that says "Click here to Email Jobcentre Plus". Finally, clicking on that gives you the form you want.
Hi Peter
Thanks for this. I'll give it a try. Sorry to be so long moderating your comment. I'm a bit depressed at the moment, and not keeping up with correspondence.
In fact, it seems that they've changed it again. All the "Contact us" links now point to the same page, but that page now contains an option "I have a query not listed here" (second from bottom). Just in case things change round again, I wanted to include the direct link to the page you want, but wasn't allowed to.
I only found out it had changed again because I wanted to add my explanation to my own blog "The politics of unemployment" and I wanted to link all the pages. It's just as well that I did that. But it makes me wonder - did the info in your blog come to the attention of some bureaucrats?
The info is on my blog page titled "Jobcentres" if you are still stuck. However, seeing as you are very depressed, I doubt that it would be wise to read the rest of my blog.
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