ESA

aebaa5

Hi all,

My daughter has been told she doesnt need a face to face as they have all the information/evidence they need.

I phoned as it's been a while and her paperwork has gone to the DM twice....is this normal?

Thanks in advance 

poppy123456

Hi,

It's rare not to have a face to face assessment but it can and does happen. The good news is you can't be found fit for work without a face to face assessment.

She can ring DWP to request a copy of the assessment report to be sent to her. This will give her some idea what the decision is likely to be because they mostly go with the report.

I have no idea why her file has gone to the DM twice.

aebaa5

Thanks for your reply.

I will phone tomorrow for the assessment as I'm her appointee. I didnt believe them that she wouldn't need a f2f so I phoned the health assessment who clarified she didn't need one. 

I'm hoping it's good news so I can then move onto applying for pip for her ?

Adrian_Scope

Hello @aebaa5, just to add, you don't need to wait for the ESA results to apply for PIP, they're completely different benefits that use different criteria. People in work can be on PIP, so there's no reason you can't apply for her now and get the ball rolling.
Best of luck and let us know how you get on!

aebaa5

Morning.

Not had the letter yet but she's had a back payment of over £2000 and her ESA payment now says Eesa so looks like she's been put in support group thank goodness. I was surprised by the back pay as we only sent esa50 back in may/letter in April, do they back pay to original application last year? Her pip application came yesterday so to start that application now ?

poppy123456

Great news. Support Group extra is paid from the 14th week of her claim and not the original date she applied. As it was her first work capability assessment then a paper based assessment will always mean Support Group.

aebaa5

She has been in work group for a year?? And this is her first re-assessment???? 

poppy123456

Are you sure she wasn't on assessment rate? I'm very surprised she was backdated that amount of money if she was in the work group, usually it takes affect from the date of the decision. That amount of money suggests she's been backdated from week 14 of her claim.

Has she been sending in sick/fit notes?

aebaa5

Definitely she was placed in work group in August before she was 18. (We was estranged at the time so when shes come back I've sent letter to say can she be reassessed they sent an esa50 which we filled out) 
She hasn't required a f2f and 2344 was put in bank with her normal 2 weekly pay of 239 (16 off for loan) I'm looking forward to the letter to explain the amount.

poppy123456

I looked back at your previous threads.

Had you gone down the MR route then i would have expected them to backdate it this far. As you reported a worsening of condition then i'm surprised by the amount backdated. I'll be very interested to know the reason why it's been backdated so far because that payment does suggest about 40 weeks of backdated money.

I'm glad the correct decision was made to place her into the Support Group.

When you receive the PIP forms, make sure you put as much information as possible about how her conditions affect her. Adding 2-3 real life examples of what happened the last time she attempted that activity for each descriptor that applies to her. PIP and ESA are different benefits with different criteria.

If you have any questions please do post on the PIP/DLA part of the forum and i'm sure someone will give you some advice.

aebaa5

It wasnt a MR as such I did a very lengthy letter high lighting why she should be in support group she then got her esa50 so I filled that out and became her appointee and this is the outcome. I'll let you know what the letter says x