With Universal Credit (UC) you might find that you have to wait at least five weeks until you get your first payment.
If you don’t have enough money to last until you get paid there’s no need to worry because you can apply for an advance payment.
Advance payments are small loans to help keep you afloat until you get your first Universal Credit payment. They’re interest free so you only need to pay back what you borrowed.
You don’t have to give the money back straight away, you can pay the advance payment back over a period of 12 months and it’s easy to do. It’s automatically paid back through your Universal Credit payments each month so you don’t need to worry about sorting it out yourself. All you need to be aware of is it’ll take a little bit of money away from your Universal Credit payment each month until the full amount is paid. With that in mind, it’s really important you only borrow what money you need to help cover your household bills and living costs. This will reduce the amount you have to pay back each month.
You can ask for the advance either when you are waiting for your first payment, when you make your Universal Credit claim, or if you have reported a change in your circumstances such as finding yourself out of work.
