A mistake by DWP on my ESA.

snakes2505

Hi can anyone help me on this issue! 29/4/2014 my claim started. 2/12/2014 it was stopped because they said i was in prison! I did spend 10-12 hrs in jail because i couldnt remember address to get bail. The following day i went back to court and was granted bail. On returning home i found out my ESA had been stopped, so i called them to explain the situation and the woman i spoke to said she had to contact the jail to comfirm i was only there for 10-12 hrs and it was. So the ladie reinstatied my ESA and payments carried on as normal and i recived my budget loan £348 on 9/1/2015. I contacted ESA on monday n asked when my claim started n they said 2/1/2015. If that was the case why was they still paying me when there saying my claim was stopped and i got my budget loan 7 days after the new claim was supposed to of started! But you need to be on ESA for 26 weeks before you qualify for a budget loan! All this time i was only reciving assement rate up until Febuary 2016 when they put me on support group. I asked them to back pay me and they did but only back to 20/4/2015 but in my eyes it should be back dated to 29/4/2014. I sent a letter simlar to what ive just said and a copie of my bank statement showing payments continued and my budget loan all with in a 5 week window were they said i didnt have a claim. I sent the letter on 22/11/2018 registered post so they have to sighn for it. And today i got a text from DWP saying they have posted my documents back to me regestered post and i need to sighn for it when it arrives. Any advice please will be welcomed.  

Pippa_Alumni

Thanks for sharing this with us @snakes2505, I hope the above link provided by Mike is helpful. I'm afraid I don't have anything to add to this myself, but please do keep us updated with this and we'll do our best to advise and point you in the right direction.

BenefitsTrainingCo

Hi @snakes2505 I cannot be sure I have enough information from what you have said, but one of the definitions of a "prisoner" for ESA is someone who is detained in custody awaiting trial or sentence.  Arguably you were even if only for 10-12 hours, so this may have stopped your claim.  However, I would argue that as this was less than 12 weeks (of course) then the two periods should be linked together and as such the two periods should be treated as one hence the component should be payable after a 13 week assessment period starting 29/4/14.  You mention starting to get the extra component from February 2016 at first, I think this means the decision on the back dating was made some time ago.  The DWP may say it is too late to challenge this decision now, in which case you would need to argue for an anytime review on the grounds that they made an official error, in this case an error of law on the original decision. This allows the decision to be looked at without the 1 month deadline.