A friend of mine needs to claim housing benefit for a private place,

Does anyone know how long it normally takes for housing benefit to be sorted out?

I didn't know you can.. I would be intested to know if they get it. It would help me or my wife to sort out the housing dispute. What is his or her circumstance?

Course you can:), he is claiming jsa

Ah well in that case fair enough!

I *think* its a few weeks, might not even take that long. It took my mum about 6 weeks, when her partner was out of work but she still had a job (I think it was more to do with them loosing her paperwork to declare her earnings and what not) its probably more straight forward if he receives JSA.

Probably best getting it straight from the horses mouth. This is an extract from Sheffield City Council's website...

"I’d like to contact the Benefits Service

We hope that the information provided on the Benefit web pages will answer most of your enquiries. If after reading these pages you still have a query, there are various ways that you can obtain further help and advice about Housing and Council Tax Benefit.

You can telephone the Benefits Call Centre on (0114) 273 6777. This number is available between 08.30 am to 5.30 pm, Monday to Friday.

You can fax us on (0114) 273 6356.

You can write to us at the following address: Benefits Service, PO Box 1310, Sheffield, S1 1UY

You can email us at benefits@sheffield.gov.uk"

he needs to take all his info including claim form, proof of rent and id plus any proof of income i.e JSA although they can obtain this from DWP/JC+. If all proof in then should be processed quite quickly. if on JSA contribution based also must take in proof of any other income for him and any partner and 2 full months bank statements. if JSA income based then this is not needed

you can claim housing benefit if you have to pay rent - it is calculated using the income you have coming into the house. Also savings can be taken into account although so much of these are disregarded