My paperwork from the DWP

Mikey44

i have received my pack from the DWP and I am shocked by the amount of Blatent lies that we’re spun by the Medical Professional that did my Assessment who was a Nurse working for ATOS it’s disgusting and hurtful what lies that have been Spun 

mikehughescq

Sadly not an unusual story. However, unless you have a recording/transcription you can’t prove they lied. You can therefore only state that it contains factual inaccuracies. If you’re going to challenge the decision via a mandatory reconsideration you need to focus less on what they have said and more on what your actual case is. Which points should you score; why and what’s your evidence for that. Only 17% of MRs succeed but that figure is likely to be rising. However, if you had to go to appeal you have a 71% chance of success with a winnable case and a representative and you’re mostly kicking at an open door when it comes to discrediting HCP reports. 

The point is that discrediting a HCP report does not get you PIP. It just lowers the weight given to it as evidence. If however your evidence and argument is poor it still won’t outweigh their report so you need to focus on your case not theirs. 

Yadnad

Brilliant Mike.

Mikey44

I’m heading to Tribunal as soon as I get a date,I’m just annoyed that people feel they have to lie to save our Poor government money that’s used to pay benefit to deserving people, sorry for the rant it’s just so disheartening 😡😡

mikehughescq

I tend not to get into discussions which use teens like deserving and deserving. Government figures on benefit fraud have been qualified for decades so they’re wholly unreliable and I’ve no idea how people develop such wonderful skills so as to assess invisible impairments. Most impairments are invisible. Let’s not go there perhaps.

RoseRed

I can totally sympathise. Everything is distorted, symptoms are ignored and not written about and anything positive (like blowing your own nose!) is construed as fully capable. They don't even contact your doctor or medical references. Seek out a benefits capable solicitor on a no-win no-fee deal and get them to register a mandatory reconsideration ASAP.

mikehughescq

Sadly there are few benefits capable practising solicitors and you certainly dint need one at the MR stage. 

Also worth clarifying that when a claim is made the burden of proving entitlement falls onto the claimant and thus there is no obligation for DWP to seek evidence on your behalf. 

RoseRed

I have just gone through 20 months of mandatory reconsideration process for PIP. I had tried to get help at my local CAB but cutbacks have reduced their workforce and increased their workload. It was difficult to get an appointment then even more difficult to get regular support. I found a local solicitor who specialises in benefits and he took on my case for a no-win no-fee deal. There isn't anything he doesn't know about the benefits system and his advice is invaluable. I was put in the work related activity group and my ESA was stopped. Thanks to him it has just been reinstated after 8 months. I have been to every interview, assessment and tribunal you can imagine. Sometimes, over that 20 months, I thought I would just lay down and die as it would be easier for me and my family who were supporting me financially during this time. I was so low at one point I almost took an overdose. I see now that is exactly what the process is meant to do: humiliate, demoralise, dehumanise and depress a human to such a degree that they just lose the will to live and expire slowly. Below you will find links to help you find legal advice regarding benefits appeals. Don't try doing it without help. You won't succeed. 
1. https://www.turn2us.org.uk/Working-With-Us/Challenging-Decisions
2. https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/getting-advice

Topkitten

I don't think I have seen any figures for it but I do wonder how much are outright lies and how much is simple incompetence committed by assessors with little or no experience and little training all because the system now has such a bad aura that few, if any, really competent staff will have anything to do with it.

As for fraud..... the figures I have found online plus those few cases I am aware of usually use back pain. Most people have, at some time, suffered from it so they have some idea how to make it sound bad. It's an invisible disability so easier to pretend that the person has it. There are also a large number of stories online and easy to find to give information to those not really suffering. The trouble is that this rebounds on real sufferers as they will start out as suspects and have to prove they really do have it whilst not being able to cope unlike those that are trying it on who can cope as normal and without the stress, distress and pressure. Maybe that's why I get a little fed up with people assuming that my spinal issues cause back pain (which they don't really) and become a little "over the top" trying to prove my point.

TK

mikehughescq

HCPs basically have their own professional qualification and then 5 to 7 days training as a HCP which is largely generic disability awareness and learning enough about the HCP process. After that it’s all speculation as to what happens but I suspect we know enough to be able to say that some strive to do an excellent job and some are influenced by others to find shortcuts to survival. Few do the job full time as they are in quasi-medical professions where full time work is hard to come by. Many are therefore either very young and lacking life experience or struggling to get by just as much as claimants. Unless the younger ones have ill family or friends their actual life experience may not have involved impairment at all. It amuses me and makes me sad that the very empathy claimants with disabilities would want for themselves is something they rarely extend to HCPs. It is of course entirely understandable that that’s the case but it doesn’t make it right. Walking a mile in anyone else’s shoes is always an eye opener. HCPs have a difficult job made harder by poor traing which inevitably means poor practice and subjectivity come into play.

Forum posters love to think they’re in the majority but that’s most unlikely as we know that forums are generally full of negative stuff whether it’s like here, football, money or whatever. No-one will find a forum full of positivity on any subject. If you want that you need a blog. That’s why I despair a little when people call HCPs “liars” without a thought for the other side of the story. Careless, pressured, badly expressed and factually incorrect yes of course but out and out provable lies are rare and in any case impossible to prove without a transcription. I have also observed many times that proving someone else wrong does not make you right and doesn’t make a case for qualifying for benefit. 

The other side of the coin is that fraud figures from DWP, like their whole accounts, have been qualified (not accepted as accurate) for decades now. I know from professional experience that they are hideously over-stated and most of all that phrase applies to disability benefits where fraud is minimal.

Allied to that is the contribution of the news media. Without bad news there is largely no news so again stories of fraud make good stories but they’re generally seen as being at a way higher level than the reality because the rare stories are great stories and are given such prominence. Many welfare rights advisers look at those stories and what we see is a person who has been badly represented and who often has a case there was no fraud at all. 

That brings me to my final point,which is that solicitors nowadays are more interested in welfare benefits than ever before because recent changes have been so broad and ill-thought out that the potential for EA 10 damages, human rights challenges or judicial review is huge. In the past few years the role of the UT as makers of caselaw has diminished significantly as a result. So, there are some great solicitors out there. However, as with any type of adviser it’s hard to deduce who is good and who is not.

I don’t think it’s possible for a lay person to credibly say, for example as in this thread, that there isn’t anything a rep doesn’t know. As a lay person how would they know that? @RoseRed gives a lovely description of why representation is much more than turning up on the day but the take away from that should be no more their representative was great for them based on their experience. They’ve no way of knowing whether the person was objectively good or not. I have for example sat in a room listening to someone talking to parents of people with VIs about benefits and VIs for an hour. I hoped to learn something. The parents took lengthy notes and came out raving about the session. I had to write to the host organisation to explain in detail that their workshop leader had given out around 70% wholly inaccurate information.  

Shlbly

Mikey44 said:

i have received my pack from the DWP and I am shocked by the amount of Blatent lies that we’re spun by the Medical Professional that did my Assessment who was a Nurse working for ATOS it’s disgusting and hurtful what lies that have been Spun 

It is happening everywhere I’m afraid, I have had it happen to me twice now, just had my third assessment on the 8/8 and dreading the report! I’m hoping that I had my local Councillor present might help, as lost my advocate due to not covering my area.
Then yesterday my friend who is riddled with rheumatoid arthiritis for 35 years, plus other things has just had it happen to her, it’s disgusting what they get away with. 
Complained to Atos with help from CAB re my second one and got nowhere.
All I can suggest is get help to do a MR, I used the Disability Drop in centre who are brilliant.
good luck, hopefully one day this will stop!!

wittygal1996

Common everywhere. My son’s first ever assessment report was full of inaccuracies. My son’s social worker accompanied me to the second one because I asked her to record the assessment and take notes on what she was seeing. If more people recorded the assessment or asked someone else to take notes this might help stop the issue. 

Yadnad

wittygal1996 said:

Common everywhere. My son’s first ever assessment report was full of inaccuracies. My son’s social worker accompanied me to the second one because I asked her to record the assessment and take notes on what she was seeing. If more people recorded the assessment or asked someone else to take notes this might help stop the issue. 

Was a copy of that recording handed to the assessor? Alternatively you or anybody with you is not allowed to record a PIP assessment without prior permission and with the appropriate equipment.

Notes can be taken but they cannot be used as evidence at an appeal not unless you get permission from the assessor.

Liam_Alumni

Hi @Mikey44, how are you getting on?

Have you decided to appeal? There's lots of useful information about appealing a DWP benefits decision if so. 

Mikey44

Hello Liam I’m good thank you and hope you are as well,I have appealed and am waiting for my Tribunal date to sort out this mess 😡😡😡 I am getting help from Welfare Rights and the Lady has already written her Submissions for the Case day.You have to fight to be heard they want you to give up but please DONT fight all the way but get help CAB Welfare Rights get what you are owed and deserve 
Mikey 

Liam_Alumni

Hi @Mikey44,

I'm glad you're well and that you've decided to appeal. Let us know how it goes and if we can help in any way!