ESA/PIP/SDP - Confused by new ESA letter.
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I am on ESA Support Group with SDP, whenever they move me over to UC - does this mean I will be worse off?
Or is it the same amount but they are just changing the name to UC instead of ESA?
With regards to brother who has had his migration notice letter and his ESA is ending in Feb. What’s the best approach here? Would he best waiting until January before applying for UC, so he can continue to get his recently awarded SDP for a few more months? Or does this not really matter due to the Transitional Protection that was mentioned above?
Does moving over to UC from ESA also trigger another medical review?
Appreciate the guidance navigating this. It’s quite stressful for me too, as I’ve only just gone through the headache of the PIP procedure a few months ago - and now this UC stuff to look at.0 -
You will not be worse off yourself, the advice I gave for your brothers claim applies to yours as well.
It doesn't matter when he claims due to the TP.
No, moving currently doesn't trigger a medical review.
There are possible changes on the
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Thanks for your reassurance, I find this terribly confusing so not too sure how things will pan out.
You say I won’t be worse off. I just want to be sure I am understanding you correctly. So when I move over to UC I will still receive the same amount as before, for both ESA and SDP?
I was getting myself a little bewildered online trying to look this up.
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Yes, at the point of claiming UC you won't be worse off due to Transitional Protection. The amount of TP given makes sure you receive the same amount of money.
TP will erode over time as elements increase annually, or if you entitlement to a new element.
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As your brothers ESA includes the SDP then I’d advise him to claim UC as late as possible, even as late as the final date on the letter.
Although no one will be worse off on point of migration the TP does erode over time. This means if other elements increase or you become entitled to other elements, the TP decreases until such a time it will erode completely. Until eventually those that are claiming SDP will be receiving the same amount of money as those that don’t.
This is my exact situation and when I receive my letter I will not be claiming UC until the very last day on the letter.
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Ah, thank you again for you input poppy - so my first gut reaction was pretty accurate then, ultimately SDP will be lost. Kind of annoying as we’ve both only just recently got that.
I’ve not had a UC migration letter yet myself but yeah, not looking forward to that.
I’ll certainly pass along your advice and help brother to sort his UC move out as late possible then. I’ve still not seen his letter or UC form for myself yet, he’s just told me he has got it; with a deadline of Feb. He does have a mild learning disability too, so he wasn’t in the best of moods when I first explained I thought this could impact SDP.
Obviously he only just got his backpay a week or two before this migration letter arrived. It kind of feels a little malicious on DWP’s part but I expect that’s probably just a coincidence.
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I've now got my own UC Migration Notice letter. I have about a 3 month deadline.
I am currently in the ESA Support Group, does this mean I will stay in this when I move to UC?
I'm just worried about being called to attend a job centre meeting. I'm hoping being in the Support Group will bypass that.
My brother who is in the WRAG group has an appointment booked with the job centre following his UC Migration Notice. Not that we agree he should be in the WRAG group anyway, as they haven't called him in for years, nor pushed him into work due to his learning difficulties.
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Hi,
You will be entitled to LCWRA from the start of your claim. That is the UC equivalent of ESA Support Group.
Most people still have a Job Centre visit to confirm ID. Though that can be done over the phone if preferred.
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It’s been a minute (or months), just trying to give this another look again for my mum.
I am a little confused over the type of pension she has, I believe it’s the standard type state pension. I may have mentioned before we tried to claim Pension Credit for her but this turned into a right stressful time with Housing Benefit writing a letter demanding bank statements. This was due to the Pesnion Credit decision letter - which incorrectly doubled her savings and said she didn’t qualify.
We proved our case with bank statements and all was fine, however my mum was stressed out by all this and didn’t want to pursue Pension Credit after this.
I’m just trying to look into SDP again to see if we can claim this for her. With regards to PIP I know she meets that specific criteria for SDP, I “don’t think” her standard State Pension meets the criteria. I did see that Housing Benefit was mentioned on the Turn2Us website though, that having HB could make a person eligible for SDP. That was the way I interpreted it anyway.
I am not sure if this is correct. If she has majority of rent paid by Housing Benefit and has PIP, does this means she is eligible for SDP?
For context she previously had the full rent paid by Housing Benefit when she was on ESA, but for whatever reason when she transitioned from ESA to State Pension they decided she has to pay some rent.
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Housing benefit is irrelevant in this case. It will be her daily living part of PIP and all other adults in the house that also claim a qualifying disability benefit that will qualify her for SDP, known as SDA in Pension Credit.
Without a PIP daily living award the maximum weekly income for a single person would be £218.15/week, this means that if her state pension and any other pension she maybe receiving total to at least that amount there would be no entitlement to PC. Due to the SDA her weekly income before the cut off would be an extra £81.50/week, which is a total £299.65/week. If her income (not including PIP, HB or Council tax) are less than this then there would be entitlement to PC. See link.
With a PC award she would be entitled to maximum HB because there would be no non dependant deductions due to her PIP.
There's also a PC calculator here that she can use.
There's no maximum capital (savings) limit when claiming PC. It's up to £10,000 and for every £500 over that amount PC would reduce by £1/week. There would still be maximum entitlement to HB and CTR.
Thinking back to the advice I gave you quite sometime ago, I'm very surprised to see that she hasn't yet claimed it. It can be backdated by 3 months so I would advise her to ask for this when she does claim it.
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I don’t think she wants to pursue a claim for PC any more due to the last failed attempt - and the levels of stress brought on by this. I’ll try to explain as best I can and give you an idea of issues encountered.
I have mentioned PC again a few weeks ago to her and suggested that this time we do not select the option to backdate that way they can’t possibly make the same mistake again.
I did the application and such for her last time but due to whoever (PC decision maker) looked at the claim form, they clearly misunderstood and doubled her savings - this opened up a whole can of worms and we assume this is what triggered HB to demand bank statements.
This was particularly difficult because she doesn’t do online banking and the local banks have all shut up shop, so this was particularly inconvenient with her disabilities and me trying to help her with travel at the different banks we needed to get to.
Looking back on the previous attempted PC claim from about two years ago. It was clear to see from their decision letter where they went wrong. I thought perhaps I may have made a mistake. If I recall correctly her savings were about £7000, although we don’t really consider it savings as this is ultimately her monthly PIP income built up due to being unable to get out as much.Where I am certain the misunderstanding is was with regards to an option to backdate the claim a few months further. At the time on TV moneysavingexpert Martin Lewis was recommending that pensioners who claim PC should select the option to backdate to ensure they get an extra payment - I think this was an extra payment for gas bills due to cold weather at the time. I can’t recall specifically. But anyway, I recall selecting this option but there was a box to fill in asking what your savings are at the date of your claim. And when choosing to backdate a few months there’s another box asking for your savings amount at the time of the backdated option. So ultimately they were both the same figures with roughly £600 or so difference between the dates. In the decision letter they clearly added both figures together. And quickly then we had a poorly toned HB letter demanding bank statements - which caused a stressful time.
I did try to explain to my mum that it’s clearly a misunderstanding and was clear to see where the error was in the PC decision letter. But I could not get her to agree to phone to inform them of this. She just wanted to leave it as is, and I didn’t want to push and cause any further ill health beyond having to take her to banks and get statements. The HB demands were quickly squashed once I got the statements emailed at least, which was a relief.
I will try to check her exact State Pension monthly amount later, I know for certain at least that with regards to PIP she has enhanced on both components.
I’m not sure I can convince her yet to try for PC again, but if it’s possible she could claim SDP without going down the Pension Credit rabbit hole again, then that was something I was hoping to explore for her.
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Hi @W348
It sounds like an official error was made in the decision. If that's the case you don't need to re-apply again for pension credit.
Instead you can just do an MR which is a must simpler process than a new application. You can do the even if its over 13 months since the decision. Your allowed to do this because of their official error.
The official error being a calculation mistake by the decision maker.
You don't have to ring you can send a letter. You can just put a letter in the post with the subject 'MR official error' and explain what's gone wrong to the DWP in the body of the letter and let them work it out.
Equally, I would advise booking an appointment with a welfare rights organisation such as Citizens Advice or instead an older persons charity which provides benefits support such as Age UK.
Hearing the advice from an independent third party may take some of the strain off you.
Hope this is of help.
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I have had a look at her bank today. Her pension is £884.80 paid monthly (so £221.20 weekly). Alongside this she also has enhanced on both PIP elements.
If I am understanding your post correctly the SDP/SSA of £81.50 weekly would put her pension beyond the limit - which means she is not eligible then, I think? Am I understanding this correctly?This is fine, if she’s not eligible at least we know and don’t have to worry about chasing up something for nothing.
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I just gave the pension credit calculator a quick runthrough and it says she could get an extra £78.45 weekly but would need to claim to confirm this.
I’ll try and speak to her again about it this week. I’d be reluctant to try the backdated option this time - as mentioned when we did that last time this seemed to be what caused confusion for PC decision maker, as they added savings from both dates together, when they were the same amount.
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I will see if I can find her old PC decision letter over the weekend. I’m not sure how long ago that was now, I think it may even be upto 2 years old at this point. I guess then that would be past any deadlines for a mandatory reconsideration. I’d use the reason of ill health and stress as the reason for taking so long. In particular the stress their decision caused by having housing benefit demanding unnecessary statements.
If a new claim is required I think I would want to try a paper form this time as then I can explain savings are the same amount between the current date and the date from 3 months ago. Is there a PC form online that I could print off?
There’s no option or box to explain in the online web form that the amounts are the same (or there wasn’t back on the last attempt). It just asked what your savings were on both dates. The answer was correct from us, but they seemed to add both figures together in their decision.0 -
My brother is having some difficulties now following his UC Migration. I could do with some tips here to help him get things resolved.
He attended his first UC appointment with our mother, and was told he wouldn’t be called in again - much like his past experience with ESA WRAG.
However, he was called in again (via. his online journal I believe - I am not familiar with this myself) attended on his own. He’s told us that he now has been told to do a CV and apply for work at 30/hrs week. He says he mentioned the last appointment where this wasn’t required, and this other person said that information was incorrect.
How’s best to navigate this? His mental health can be challenging at times with stressful situations as his GP is aware.
I’m thinking short-term he will probably need sick notes from his GP to get the job centre off his back. But that presumably is a limited time thing.
Ideally I think he probably needs to get in the Support Group. I do think there’s a change of circumstance as a year ago he was seeing a psychiatrist for several months who has him on some new tablets to calm him down. I can’t recall what they are but I think they can’t be prescribed by a GP, and only the psychiatrist could get him started on these.Is there a specific method to get someone moved from WRAG to Support Group that hopefully doesn’t require the hassle of a new work capability claim form and interview?
Many thanks for any advice.0 -
Unfortunately JCP staff often give incorrect advice. As he was in ESA WRAG then that converts into UC LCW which does require appointments.
However while he is expected to undertake work preparation activities, he cannot be forced to apply for jobs.
It might be his ESA status hasn't been confirmed yet, this often takes a few weeks, and he's currently on the system as someone with full work commitments, instead of partial ones.
He needs to report a worsening change of health via his Journal, and submit a Fit Note (and continue to supply them without any breaks or gaps until a decision is made).
This will trigger a re assessment of his condition, he'll be sent a UC50 form and have a medical assessment.
The criteria for UC LCWRA (ESA SG equivalent) are here.
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Edit: You mentioned his ESA status might not have updated yet. Does this mean there’s a possibility this will all just work itself out and we don’t need to rush with getting him to GP for sick notes? He has an online journal, is there anything you recommend I should ask him about this?
Thanks for that. The one thing that is somewhat confusing about his case is that he was in ESA WRAG before and they did not bother him with looking for work. He was happy with getting out of the house when he wakes up and occasionally doing some voluntary work like bucket collecting, and socialising with a few people in this way.
So he was in the WRAG group before with ESA, but tbh hardly ever did any voluntary work anyway. I just recall back then the job centre were happy to leave him to voluntary work if he felt able to. Besides that one appointment many years ago they never bothered pestering him for work.Obviously migrating to UC from ESA has clearly triggered something to get the JC on his back - despite still being in the same WRAG group. I’m just a bit worried as he does not cope well with stress at all and can be difficult in the house to cope with and a struggle for his GP too. He’s been calm for months now with his current medication, but he can be difficult for a pensioner and younger brother to keep with if he gets wound up.
To my knowledge at the moment I am aware he keeps talking about an online journal that he is typing in. I think this is something the JC staff can see, he’s not great at explaining things so we’re a little worried he’s going to make his situation worse. He’s mentioned they have set him deadlines in his journal for things, I’m not completely sure of all the details here. He’s rather stressed and looking pale and rambling he wants to sanction them.
I’ve got my own migration to worry about in April but I am in the Support group. Trying not to think about that right now. Just want to try and navigate this for my brother and ease him in the simplest hassle-free direction without getting him overly worked up any more.
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When you apply for UC you have access to an online account. This is called the Journal. And yes both he and the Job Centre have access.
He's in the same group yes but under UC not ESA.
The change in benefits would mean he has a different work coach now.
They do have discretion to use, but I believe from other posts that the WRAG/LCW culture is tougher more recently for the claimant than it used to be.
Would your brother be able to consent to a friend or family member being his appointee for benefit purposes?
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We’ve tried the appointee discussion many times over the years. He gets angry with this whenever the subject is brought up, tbh it’s very frustrating and difficult to help him as he’s incredibly argumentative about even the most insignificant of things at home and with strangers.
What’s the best way to approach this? If I can get on his journal with him is there anything we can say here for the JC to consider? I would like to add a note about any deadlines they have set him and point out his mental health challenges and time keeping, he’s going to find it difficult to keep checking something like that without prompting from us.
Should we say something in his journal about his past ESA WRAG experience where they left him alone for years? I believe my mother covered this when she attended his first UC appointment with him. They was told he wouldn’t be called in again at that first UC appt, as before. But for whatever reason he was called in again, went on his own this time - and now, yeah, it seems kind of a headache right now. He’s also on PIP and gets the SDP if that makes any difference to them potentially easing pressure off him.Would you suggest a GP appointment as a matter of urgency? I have no doubt his GP will be supportive, but not sure what the GP can do besides just supply sick note. Is there anything else we should ask the GP for?
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