Client “self employed”, can she claim JSA during periods of no employment?

Client is a writer who at various times during the year is awarded a commission.  She is paid per piece of work and then can be without paid work for 2-3 months.  She states that she is always writing, researching and trying to get new commissions during her “down times” therefore is always working but not always been paid for work.

She lives in a two bed private rented flat on her own.

She has HB overpayments due to not being able to provide proof of income for previous claim and has not paid any council tax for some time.

She asked for advice on benefit entitlement and I had two queries on this:

1)I was able to offer advice re LHA , there will be a massive shortfall in LHA entitlement due to the two bed rooms and high rent, as well as fluctuating income also minimal chance of getting DHP due to not needing two bedromms.  However wondered, if landlord agreed to take in another lodger and gave tenancy for one bed each, whether HB would accept this?  as tenancy being changed in order to increase LHA entitlement. 

2) Could she qualify for tax credits as claims she works more than 30 hours per week even if not being paid? or would she be able to claim JSA in the periods when she was not being paid? 

Any ideas would be welcome.

I think that the WTC could be problematic.  Researching for and writing articles to ‘store’ with the hope of selling them at a future date to be published with no firm offers or promises at the time of writing might be work done more with the hope of payment rather than an expectation of payment.  It would all depend on the facts of course.  Does she get regular commissions from the same people, for instance, with firm promises of future work?  If so then that might be an indicator of work done in expectation of payment.  If she has only ever had a handful of articles published with various people and then has to compete with other writers for future commissions then it might be harder to argue that she is working more in expectation than in hope.

Although IS cases, the following judgements may be helpful as to the meaning of “remunerative work”:

Smith v Chief Adjudication Officer [1994] CA [R(IS) 21/95]

Chief Adjudication Officer v Ellis [1995] CA [R(IS) 22/95]

Both of the above can be found on the Upper Tribunal website:
http://www.administrativeappeals.tribunals.gov.uk/aspx/Default.aspx

I’m sure Kevin D will correct me if I am wrong but if the landlord rents out one room to each of them, with separate tenancies, won’t the property become a ‘multiple occupancy’ house and the liability for council tax pass from the two tenants to the landlord - which in turn might mean an increase in rent to cover it?

The shared room rate for joint occupiers who are not partners is a problem - it is invariably (in my experience) way below half the two bedroom rate. If the landlord would let her take a lodger it might be better though of course the income will affect her LHA and CTB.