My wife is 8 months pregnant, due to her visa restrictions she has no recourse to public funds and cannot work or claim income support. I was told by the jobcentre plus to make a couple's claim and made it clear to them she has no recourse to public funds, she also has no NIN but they set up an interview for her to get one for next week.
We had applied for the sure start maternity grant since I have been on income based job seekers, I was told by the advisor on the phone at the social fund office that it was declined based on my wife not being on benefits or having a NIN but I was also told by someone else that her status should not matter since it was me who made the claim and since she is not entitled to work or benefits that we should have been granted the SSMG. I ticked the box on the SSMG form that asked if she had ever been given a NIN and said "no". Also explained on the form our situation.
So now we are waiting for her to get the NIN next week, so they can finish processing my couples claim and what we are worried about is since she has no recourse to public funds, even if they put her on couples claim and payed me the single's rate the sure state maternity grant might not still go through because she cant be on benefits. She wouldnt be receiving any benefit but I would be, and as far as the SSMG claims that only one of us needs to be on benefits or have a NIN to qualify.
Does any of this make sense? We really need some advice on this, we are going to call them up again on monday to explain in more detail and ask them to reconsider their decision. If we have to wait for the jobcentre plus to sort out the claim and her NIN that is no problem, we just do not know what to expect and need some advice....cheers!
![Confused :?](./images/smilies/icon_confused.gif)