My experience is impacted by whether or not UC helps me meet my basic needs (housing, food). If not, engagement becomes stressful and negative. Feeling as though my payments will go just as far as they need to makes each interaction with the program feel very time-sensitive and pressing. It also makes me much more aware of any delay, error, or lack of clarity within the experience itself. When one does not meet one's cost of living needs, trust becomes harder to bring to each interaction instead of anticipation or relief.

When I assess my own situations for which my UC requirements conflict with my caregiving responsibilities, job searching activities, or my own health requirements, my perception of the UC system is one of inflexibility and thus experiencing frustration with engagement activities. When my expectations do not match my experience of my daily realities of my responsibilities, it generates stress and feelings of being predisposed to failure. This contributes to my lack of motive for effective communication and tasks because I do not want my situations to not be appreciated or understood.

Comparisons to former schemes (JSA, Housing Benefit, Tax Credits) influence my perceptions of whether UC is an improvement or a reduction, and thus my attitude toward it itself. Perhaps my perceptions of past schemes have been of them being simpler or more straightforward, and UC appears to be moving backwards, thus increasing my exasperation. Conversely, if my perceptions include past schemes being piecemeal or confusing to me, UC appears to have simplified things for me.

Understanding data monitoring, journal reviews, and sanctions is why I have come to my conclusions about UC being a punitive program and how this impacts my openness during engagement tasks. Feeling as though everything is being monitored and recorded makes me very cautious with information even if it does not pertain to anything negative and makes me nervous about being misinterpreted or committing some unknown infraction leading to sanctions.

How emotionally resilient I am affects whether UC is a supportive or threatening experience for me. Stress affects my level of engagement. Observing others go through the system—their successes and failures—shapes my expectations and confidence. Hearing stories of delays, sanctions, or confusion makes me even more anxious. But success stories from others may encourage me to engage more freely. It is all part of my emotional makeup that affects how boldly I engage with the system or how freely I come to others for help when I need it.

The social stigma surrounding claiming benefits is why I feel like UC is something to be hidden or kept secret, which impacts how openly or actively I participate or ask for assistance. This stigma makes me wonder if I personally “deserve” to attempt to seek help or assistance or if it is worth seeking at all because of feelings of embarrassment associated with each interaction. It makes me feel as though this whole experience is one of being alone while seeking assistance for something meant to bring relief or support.

For me personally, UC is a bureaucratic nightmare to navigate. This alone adds to my stress levels and makes it even harder for me to want to appeal or report any kind of changes or developments. It is easy for me to want to have an empathetic system that is flexible and adaptive to any kind of change or development because anything rigid makes me want to disengage or become demotivated. It becomes all the more apparent to me to want to have my concerns ignored or to not pursue further any kind of development or change because nothing is really designed for me personally or for my circumstances.

My own employment experience—the cycles of stability and instability—influences whether or not I personally regard Universal Credit as a safety net or as something integral to my livelihood cycle. When my own employability is stable, Universal Credit is helpful but supplementary, while being unemployed or having unsteady employability raises my stress levels and my experience of being part of the social security network is put under pressure.

How Universal Credit appears to me is largely informed by past negative experiences with government-related systems. Due to situations whereby I have been ignored or misunderstood and treated unkindly, my impression or perception of any aspect of social security is naturally one of apprehension and wariness, since none of my concerns may possibly be taken seriously or regarded favorably.

This experience impacts my overall perception of Universal Credit and my approach to seeking help or information through it. What should make me confident to seek help or information becomes something that gives me pause or prevents me from seeking help at all because of fear of being ignored or having another negative experience. This can also cause me to put off seeking help or have trouble articulating my need for help because possibly—you never know—nothing may come of it anyway based on my past experience.

The media coverage tends to depict both negative portrayals of claimants or cases of system failure. This generates fear of being judged and creates lack of trust. Looking at the information being presented, my own perception of UC is then tainted to be negative based on what I'm hearing, which is that UC is essentially a reaction to economic pressures and austerity measures. Which makes not want to engage as I'm very uncertain.

My views on UC are derived from my personal experience of Universal Credit: long wait times, digital processes, and erratic payment levels. It makes me very nervous and at times unwilling to participate. Alongside my experience, stories shared by my family members, friends, and social circles also shape my impression because hearing others' difficulties makes me very nervous to participate.

Hi Changing Realities. Yeah, I'd like to answer the big question of the week: what is my perception on it is based on how I've been treated in the past when I've gone to the DWP for assessments. Being disabled as well, it was just horrific. I actually got manhandled when I accidentally picked the wrong door to go down in the lift. Three security guards grabbed me, my goodness, it was like I was in a prison. I was mortified, I was embarrassed, it's such a stressful situation. You don't really want to engage with those people. And when I was in there, every time I asked a question, they were like, " I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. I don't know the answer to that." So because I haven't got any faith in them. And when I asked her what she'd done before, as a job, she said she was a barber so she hadn't had much training or anything but this is the person that is deciding whether or not I should have benefit money for my medical conditions that mean I can't work. You just don't have any faith in the system and it does cloud everything you do. So I'm already guard up, bit of an attitude. Well not an attitude but I'm just expecting the worst and I don't engage. I try my very best to get the hell out of there as quickly as I possibly can. It is based on how you're treated and before then, I've been treated when I did get a job, it was a while ago before I was poorly, I was very, very excited, and they stopped my benefits immediately and I hadn't even started the job, and nor was I going to get paid for a good month and a half and she just went "that's not my problem. Go to the food bank." And that was just before Christmas, when I had two kids on my own.