My very first trip down to my local social welfare office wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. There were very few people there at the time and all I had to do was make an appointment to come back and speak to a welfare officer. I also had to bring along a form that I was asked to complete. When I came back the following week for my appointment I was asked for proof of my redundancy i.e., the letter I would've received from my unit manager but I hadn't got it with me because I hadn't been told to bring it when I was making my appointment so I had to make another trip to the office the next day which was a bit annoying.
To collect my payment, I had to go to my local post office but I hadn't got a social services card with me as it hadn't been issued yet so I had a bit of an argument with the post officer worker behind the counter because she informed me that I would need to it receive my payment but she gave it to me anyway after I told her that I hadn't been given one - I think I just showed her some form of ID I had in my wallet. I had to go back to the dole office.. again.. to ask for a temporary card which I should've been given when I had my appointment with the welfare officer. I found that sometimes the queue for the Queries hatch could be ridiculously long and opening another hatch would've made a big difference which did happen from time to time. I have payment protection for two loans so I have to make twice monthly trips to the office to have a form completed to prove that I am unemployed. This can be a bit tedious because the form only takes 2 minutes for the officer to complete and I sometimes have to queue for up to 30 minutes.
It seems that different offices have different systems of doing things. I moved back into my own apartment 2 months ago and had been renting for 10 months prior to that in a different part of the city so had to sign on at a different office. My current office has a strange system in that you can only make enquiries on certain days of the week and signing on takes place on the other days. When I first walked into the office I didn't know what queue I was supposed to be in because there were people queuing for, it seemed, 5 different hatches and the end of the queue I was supposed to be in was nearly mixed up with the queue for a different hatch. It was just by luck that I found the right queue. There was no-one available to direct me to the correct hatch - which would've been a good idea. When I finally got to speak to the officer after about 40 minutes of queuing I was told that I needed proof of address and ID so I could change my claim over to that particular office. I had left my drivers licence in my car and I just happened to have a letter from my bank in my bag so I could use that as proof of address. I had to go out to my car to get the licence and then come back and wait at one of the hatches to speak to another officer which didn't take too long which was good. I would also like to mention that there is no point in phoning an office because they don't answer the phone so why they have a telephone number is beyond me..!
My first time to sign on wasn't too stressful either. I only have to sign once a month which isn't too bad although a friend of mine only has to sign on every three months or something which is a bit strange. The queue moves pretty quickly because all people are doing is literally showing their social services card to the officer and signing and dating where they are asked to.
I've sensed tension in the air when queuing to sign on or make an enquiry and one day the guy who was queuing behind me was giving out to the guy behind him about the officers behind the hatch saying that one of them was a bit of a "tough cookie" or words to that affect and that he had seen some guy attempt to throw the chair that is stationed opposite the hatch at the window in front of her as she had probably got on the wrong side of him. He also said that he reckoned that unemployed people were seen as second class citizens by the officers but I think that was just him being paranoid. I do find that the officers can be a bit abrupt but they are probably on their guard most of the time so their job can't be the easiest either.
Notice that I've used the words queue and queuing a lot in this post.. its what we unemployed people spend a lot of time doing I've found.. :-)
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