Hoping I can get some advice on here.
I'm 28, single and have been getting jobseekers allowance for just over a year. I have a degree and was working as a substitute teacher until I stopped work. The irregularity of the work as well as a period suffering from depression has caused me to fall into a bit of a welfare trap.
For that time I've been living off the €185.80 jobseekers allowance, I pay €76 a week rent out of that and the rest goes on food, living expenses,etc. Obviously that's not always enough so I've also ended up with an overdraft, credit card and personal loan totalling €3,500. I've had no problem getting credit as my credit rating is good and I never miss repayments. I also did some private grinds for cash. I never applied for rent allowance but I do have a medical card.
I want to improve my situation and get back to working full time. I've signed up for a FAS course which started this week. It's a similar course to my degree but the main reason I signed up is to get myself back into the routine of getting up for work every morning. I assumed I would be getting the rent supplement from FAS but I've just found out I'm not entitled because the address I gave on the application is the rented house I live in and that's near the training centre. FAS are writing me a letter for the Community Welfare Officer and they said claiming the allowance that way will be fine as it's what's other people on their courses have done. Does anyone know if the rent allowance could be backdated a bit? I know I should have applied ages ago but I feel really embarassed about asking for handouts. I did manage to meet all rent payments by myself but as as result I have the pesonal debt problem so I wasn't really able to manage that well without help.
What I really want to do is the FE1 Law exams or maybe train as a legal executive first and then do the exams. I know there's loads about this in the careers section. I'd need to borrow some more money to meet the cost of this so I really need to apply for anything I'm entitled to in order to help myself out of this demoralising welfare situation.
Any advice or suggestions would be much appreciated. I really hate approaching Community Welfare Officer about this but I'm so desperate and very motivated to improve my situation I need any help I can get.
I'm 28, single and have been getting jobseekers allowance for just over a year. I have a degree and was working as a substitute teacher until I stopped work. The irregularity of the work as well as a period suffering from depression has caused me to fall into a bit of a welfare trap.
For that time I've been living off the €185.80 jobseekers allowance, I pay €76 a week rent out of that and the rest goes on food, living expenses,etc. Obviously that's not always enough so I've also ended up with an overdraft, credit card and personal loan totalling €3,500. I've had no problem getting credit as my credit rating is good and I never miss repayments. I also did some private grinds for cash. I never applied for rent allowance but I do have a medical card.
I want to improve my situation and get back to working full time. I've signed up for a FAS course which started this week. It's a similar course to my degree but the main reason I signed up is to get myself back into the routine of getting up for work every morning. I assumed I would be getting the rent supplement from FAS but I've just found out I'm not entitled because the address I gave on the application is the rented house I live in and that's near the training centre. FAS are writing me a letter for the Community Welfare Officer and they said claiming the allowance that way will be fine as it's what's other people on their courses have done. Does anyone know if the rent allowance could be backdated a bit? I know I should have applied ages ago but I feel really embarassed about asking for handouts. I did manage to meet all rent payments by myself but as as result I have the pesonal debt problem so I wasn't really able to manage that well without help.
What I really want to do is the FE1 Law exams or maybe train as a legal executive first and then do the exams. I know there's loads about this in the careers section. I'd need to borrow some more money to meet the cost of this so I really need to apply for anything I'm entitled to in order to help myself out of this demoralising welfare situation.
Any advice or suggestions would be much appreciated. I really hate approaching Community Welfare Officer about this but I'm so desperate and very motivated to improve my situation I need any help I can get.