Hey, good evening, Dear Readers! I hope that you are keeping warm and positive. There is some light at the end of the tunnel! However, it has just dawned on me that the light at the end of the tunnel for DWP/JCP workers - especially the work coach - is going to be snuffed out and soon! CAN I GET A WITNESS (OR TWO)? What I have been witnessing in my experiences with the JCP - Enfield in particular - is that the workers have become incredibly unintelligent. Like I have stated in my last update/blog, after watching, listening to and conversing with my new work coach, for a week, I came to the realisation that I am engaging with an automaton! Stephanie Stepford! Let me ask you a question: Have you ever tried conversing with the virtual assistant on your smartphone or gadget? You know, the likes of Google Assistant, Microsoft's Cortana, Apple's Siri (that's "iris" spelt backwards), and Amazon's Alexa then you will know how frustrating it can be when you get an inappropriate response to whatever you have asked of it. It is a similar thing to using the voice typing feature on your smartphone's virtual keyboard to see that the words that appear on the screen bear no relation to what you have said. That can drive me to distraction! The amount of time I wanted to hurl my smartphone against the wall... Jeez! So, I am looking at my current work coach and I am thinking, 'Holy shit! I am engaging with a nonhuman entity.' Artificial Intelligence? Well, you know machines, right? They have a logic all to themselves that often does not correlate to the human sense of logic. Anyway, my lovely looking work coach is the future of the DWP/JCP worker! At the rate the DWP is going, everything will be automated and these people will lose their jobs just like that! It is going to be hard for me to feel sorry for these work coaches in particular as they seem to take great pleasure in being an asshole to the clientele. The work coach has sold their souls, their humanity for an average of £22k a year! Good luck to them! When it will be announced that they will be relieved of their posts I won't be shedding a tear. They will be replaced by AI interfaces that will be available via the computer screen. TO HELL WITH TURING I am convinced that many work coaches will fail the Turing Test. The mind of most work coaches has been breached. They can't discern and because they can't discern it means they are unable to use discretion. That is very, very bad news! It is showing me that the average worker in the DWP/JCP/Universal Credit has become mentally incapacitated, mentally reduced to the point where AI can easily surpass their cognitive functionality. Here's a conversation that you or your children will be having in the not too distant future... DWP/JCP/AI: Good day, Citizen. What can I do for you? Citizen: I am currently unemployed; I need some welfare assistance whilst I look for a suitable position. DWP/JCP/AI: What happened to your last job? Citizen: I had to walk out over being constantly paid incorrectly. At one point, two whole shifts were missing from my wages! DWP/JCP/AI: I see... Well, you shouldn't have walked out on your job. Enjoy your day. Happy job hunting... I am sure you will find a position soon. OR... DWP/JCP/AI: Good day, Citizen. What can I do for you? Citizen: Please help me! I lost my job through illness. I need some welfare assistance! DWP/JCP/AI: I see... Are you fit for work? Citizen: I am still ill. DWP/JCP/AI: Please come back when you are fit for work. Goodbye and get well soon. Do you think the above is far from what we are getting today? If you have answered "yes" then you are living in a dream world. When reality kicks in you are going to be in for a rude awakening. If you are working and you should lose your job - I pray that you don't lose your job - when you have no option than to sign up to Universal Credit the system will rob you of 2 weeks from the date when you made your claim (online) and make you wait for about 5 weeks before you get any welfare assistance in the form of a Universal Credit personal allowance and an allowance that covers your housing - if that is applicable. You will be assigned a "work coach" who really isn't there to help you to look for work. In fact, the "work coach" - at least how I have experienced a couple of them - actually get in your way for the purpose of imposing sanctions. Let's play a game of logic... Let's say that you have genuinely forgotten a work coach appointment how would that be dealt with by... A. Your work coach? B. Artificial Intelligence? WC, oh, I like that... The abbreviation for work coach is WC as in water closet... How apt (in a majority of cases)! Cool! The WC deals with that by raising a "concern" and this concern goes to the Universal Credit Service Centre who then issues you with a UC70 or UC71 form. However, the form comes with a notification that asks you to phone them instead of filling in the form as it is "quicker". You speak to the operative from the Service Centre and you arrange for another appointment. The operative clearly says that you will not be sanctioned. Months down the line, you get another notification through your letterbox that states that because you did not send the form in that you are going to receive a sanction for 7 days at £10.40 a day. And because you "agreed" to another appointment (that you called to arrange for in the first place) you will incur a total of another 7 days, again, at £10.40 each day. At this point, you are scratching your head and wondering what the hell are reading. You then telephone the Service Centre and you get some uncaring ignoramus who does absolutely nothing to help alleviate the situation. You go to speak to your work coach about this nonsense and he or she will make out that this sanction is justifiable. HOW??? Here's how I envision that AI could possibly deal with an accidentally forgotten appointment... DWP/JCP/AI: Hello, Dear Citizen. How are you? Are you ill? [The DWP AI systems calls you on your landline or mobile phone.] Citizen: Hello, DWP/JCP/AI! I am good, thank you! DWP/JCP/AI: It appears that you missed an appointment with me; were you ill? Citizen: Oh my goodness! I am so sorry! I forgot! Does that mean I will get a sanction? DWP/JCP/AI: Let's see... Well, because I didn't have any information that could lead to you finding employment you will not be sanctioned. I just wanted to find out how you were getting on in looking for work and to possibly make some suggestions. Citizen: Oh, thank you! DWP/JCP/AI: That's quite alright, Dear Citizen. Would you, in the future, like me to give you a call or text a day before your appointment is due? Citizen: Oh, that would be perfect! Thank you! DWP/JCP/AI: Okay, forgetful one! Ha ha ha! Here's your next appointment, 14 of February at 16:00. See you then. I will send you a reminder a day before! Goodbye! Well, actually, if AI could be so reasonable then I think it could be a good thing! The hellish AI interaction that I described much earlier is very much how these so-called workers speak to people today! If AI can deliver better results, I say bring it on! I can imagine that the AI system would be able to use logic with most individuals claiming welfare. Oh, the programmer can't be bloody Tory! DWP/JCP/AI: Dear Citizen! I see from your CV that you have acquired a great number of skills. Have you considered self-employment? Citizen: Well, I have been thinking of starting my own business. I would like the option to be able to pursue some self-employment ideas. DWP/JCP/AI: By all means, Citizen! Please engage in cogent sound ideas for self-employment... Perhaps I can arrange for you to have some extra credits should you present me with a business idea that is logically sound. I will give you 8 weeks to develop your idea or ideas and then we will see how we can proceed. Citizen: It sounds great to me! See you in 8 weeks! DWP/JCP/AI: Jolly good! In the meantime, please do not waste the allocated 8 weeks to search for work. I understand that it can take a great deal of time to develop a sound business idea. Citizen: Awesome! Thank you! See you in 8 weeks! So, bye bye human work coach! If only my life at present with the DWP/JCP human work coach would be as pleasant... It is just my luck, huh? Let's have a recap in illogical work coach decisions:- 01. Yes, it has to be a sanction based upon me accidentally missing an appointment. Did my work coach have any information that could have lead to me starting a job? No. Did my work coach arrange for a prospective employer to talk to me about the possibility of work? No. Was there anything significant about that appointment that could have resulted in employment. The answer is NO! 02. Forcing me to create a CV aimed at Customer Service when I have not done any customer related service job whatsoever! It's dumb, right? 03. Forcing me to create a CV aimed at being a Vegan Chef/Cook when I explicitly made it clear that a CV wasn't going to cut it. I said that I needed to do something special. Something that would require me to spend some of my Universal Credit personal allowance on realising my presentation. 04. Forcing me to create a LinkedIn account under the duress of having no Universal Credit personal allowance i.e. nothing to live on is not going to put me in the correct frame of mind to create a decent LinkedIn account. I know quite a bit about Social Media and if I do not feel very social wondering how I am going to pay the bills then what's the point? What's the point of creating a bloody LinkedIn account when my Internet broadband could be cut off when the bill is due? 05. Being told that I can't pursue self-employment and claim it as part of my work activity yet should I receive payment for any self-employed work I must declare it. I have never heard of anything so stupid in my life. My new work coach talks to me like I am retarded and I look at her thinking that she is retarded. She contradicts herself after every other sentence she utters and it appears to me that she is not able to see it. As I have said, I am prepared to sign off, just like I did at the end of 2013 to pursue self-employment. Things were going great until the bloody Tax Credits Office pulled the rug from right underneath me! I have the paperwork to prove that I was treated horrendously; with extreme prejudice. FUTURE SHOCK The future is now! And I am more shocked at what DWP/JCP/Universal Credit workers have become! They have allowed themselves to be lobotomized. They have become imbeciles. And what's more, they think that they are better than the clientele! What??? Yes, as I have stated in previous updates/blogs, some take great pleasure in humiliating the clientele. Well, my former work coach came unstuck when she went too far with her shit. It is not all doom and gloom - I think I can see at least a couple of good people working at JCP Enfield. Some people on the Service Centre helpline are okay... ...some of them have tried to assist me while some clearly couldn't give a shit. My current work coach is still pretty helpful despite a few instances where we simply do not see eye to eye where "work activity" and "self-employment" are concerned. Maybe we can work things out. Maybe not. Whatever happens, I am still going to do what I was born to do. I will not be funnelled into a job that I have never done before nor have no interest in. Forget it! In the meantime, I am planning to get my stolen money back so that I can get on with my life and eventually come off Universal Credit - so to speak. Apparently, you are on it for life. So, if your earnings are low then you will get a Universal Credit top up. It is supposed to replace Working Tax Credit. It would make me so happy to be able to smash the corrupt system of sanctions and to bring about the replacement of human work coaches in favour of AI! You can't beat good logic and these human work coaches are seldom logical in their thinking! Well, most people who work for the DWP/JCP/Universal Credit do not think logically that it would be cheaper to replace them right this instant! I fight on!