Sickness Benefit to dole-How?

My wife's been out sick from June 06 (pregnancy related) till Feb 07 when she was diagnosed with depression and is still on sick benefit- she's been refused invalidity pension which we dont mind anymore because we want to send in her last cert and sign on.However, if she's not entitled to much money we're screwed.

We have 3 children and I work full time(For now-Dublin Bus!)

The decision as to whether to should remain on Illness benefit is made by the doctor. If he feels she is ready to return to work he will issue a final cert, and then she can sign on for Jobseekers benefit if she does not have a job to return to.
However she needs to be available for work and actively seeking work

why do you have exclaimation marks around "claimed"???

"Claimed" was a bad choice of wording- Bottom line is she cant go back to work yet with a 4month ,2 year old and 5 year old around but she's ready to come off the sick- what choices do we have-if any?

dole is now referred to as either Jobseekers benefit (JB) or jobseekers allowance (JA). The former is based on your PRSI record while the second is means-tested. You move from JB to JA after (i think) 15 months of continuous sign-ing on at which point you are means tested. A spouse's income would come into the equation at that point.

As the name suggests, a condition of JB or JA is that the person is available for and actively seeking work and this criterion is likely to be tested at some point when signing on (e.g by referral to FAS or the offer of training, etc). It wouldn't be payable therefore to someone who can't work for family reasons.

Thank you Staples- that explains it all