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Unsure of UC backdated amount?

harvey119
harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
edited April 2021 in Universal Credit (UC)
So, the person i care for was recieving LCW ESA. He moved area so had to then claim UC instead, so they then awarded him UC LCW rate as soon as his UC claim started as expected, without any waiting period to get the LCW money.

Then fast forward a bit and i knew he was entitled to the LCWRA UC after reading all the rules ect, so i submited an appeal on his behalf to challange the LCW decision and to recieve LCWRA from the start of his UC claim, instead of LCW.

The appeal was successful and ruled in his favour. So now they have come round to sorting out the backdated money, i was expecting the LCWRA rate would be backdated to the start of his UC claim because he didnt have a waiting period or have to send dr notes ect and was getting the LCW extra money too from the start. But what they have done is, gone through all of his previous payment statements and put the LCWRA extra money/element ONLY on the dates starting from the 4th month of the claim, so they have not awarded it for the first 3 months of the UC claim. 

And on top of that, they have actually removed the LCW extra money too from the first 3 months of statements, so his payment statements state that he was getting £130ish less those months than what he actually recieved.

So then based on that, they have worked out they only owe him £600 backdated for 5 months of LCWRA extra, it would of been £900 but because they removed the LCW from the first 3 months it removed over £300 from the backpaid amount. The total amount we expected was approx £1700, which would of been the case if they had awarded the LCWRA rate from the start of the claim. Please advise? 
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Comments

  • MarkM88
    MarkM88 Community member Posts: 3,127 Connected
    I’m not fully up to speed with UC as never needed to claim it and I’m sure others will be along to provide help soon. 

    My understanding is, you won’t receive back pay for the first 3 full assessment periods because LCWRA is only paid from the 4th full assessment period. 
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    I didn't think the waiting period applied when you transfer from esa though, he was already receiving the lcw rate from start of claim because of that.

    Just phoned up the appeal line and spoke to them, they said that dwp have lapsed the appeal and submitted an offer on 13th of April, even though the tribunal sent the appeal successful decision to them on the 12th so now it goes to a judge apparently :(
  • calcotti
    calcotti Community member Posts: 10,010 Disability Gamechanger
    edited April 2021
    harvey119 said:
    So, the person i care for was recieving LCW ESA. He moved area so had to then claim UC instead, so they then awarded him UC LCW rate as soon as his UC claim started as expected, without any waiting period to get the LCW money.

    ....so i submited an appeal on his behalf to challange the LCW decision and to recieve LCWRA from the start of his UC claim, instead of LCW.

    The appeal was successful and ruled in his favour. ..
    The removal of the LCW element for the first three months appears wrong but to determine what the correct situation is I think some clarification is needed here.

    'Appeal' means requesting a Mandatory Reconsideration and, if necessary, going to a tribunal. Or do you mean that you asked for a reassessment due to a change of circumstances? If so at what point in the UC claim was this request made?

    The original decision concerning LCW was made while he was on ESA so if you appealed this decision the ESA claim would also have needed to be revised and arrears paid - is this what happened?

    Information I post is for England unless otherwise stated. Rules may be different in other parts of UK.
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    edited April 2021
    Please see previous post above yours too, not sure if I put it whilst you were writing.

    Followjng advice from a benefit charity website, I lodged a mandatory reconsideration in October kind of time, about the decision to place him into the lcw group in August, when he got moved to uc. Because he was put onto uc lcw rate as soon as uc started but I knew after reading about it that he was eligible for lcwra. 

    It was late, but accepted, but the dwp said they won't change the decision without a wca. So I then appealed for him and won the appeal. So the appeal is about placing him directly into the lcw group from esa lcw. Quite an untraditional way to appeal the lcw so that's why so little information is known about It I think. 
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    So he was paid the extra lcw rate from start of uc claim with no waiting period, but they have backdated the lcwra rate only to 3 months after his claim started, then removed the lcw money from his payment statements for Aug, sep and October last year when they edited them all
  • calcotti
    calcotti Community member Posts: 10,010 Disability Gamechanger
    edited April 2021
    harvey119 said: Just phoned up the appeal line and spoke to them, they said that dwp have lapsed the appeal and submitted an offer on 13th of April, even though the tribunal sent the appeal successful decision to them on the 12th so now it goes to a judge apparently.
    If there has already been a tribunal decision I don't understand why it would still be going to a judge. When you say the DWP submitted an offer - do you mean they contacted the person you care for? Has he received any message from DWP through Uc journal advising him when he is being treated as having LCWRA from?

    I remain confused about exactly what has happened in general. 

    The decision by UC to treat him as having LCW from the start of the UC claim on the basis of being in ESA WRAG at the time of transfer is correct. That is an administrative process and, in my opinion, is not a decision that can be appealed.

    The original decision to place him in the ESA WRAG Group could have been challenged, if done within appropriate time limits. If this had resulted in him being put in ESA Support Group he would then been treated as LCWRA at time of transfer to UC.

    If at the time of transfer to UC you considered he should be in LCWRA the process would be to report a change in health condition and request a new WCA so that LCW/LCWRA could be determined afresh. 

    I remain unclear exactly what has happened and how it has been treated so remain unclear what the correct decision is.

    What is clear is that if he was being paid the WRAG component of ESA then he is entitled to the LCW element of UC up to any point where this is replaced by LCWRA. Having neither element for the first three months of the UC claim is therefore clearly incorrect (if he was being paid the ESA WRAG component previously). Possibly, when revising the award the person doing so has (given that new LCW awards have no monetary value attached to them) overlooked that he was previously being paid ESA WRAG component and therefore entitled to the LCW element.
    Information I post is for England unless otherwise stated. Rules may be different in other parts of UK.
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    edited April 2021
    Yeah you can appeal being put into lcw group from wrag of esa when you receive the uc award, it's not very well known about though I think. I found out about it through a members only guide to uc on a charity members only site. With the uc award letter, it said if you disagree with the decision you can ask for reconsideration or appeal ect.

    Thanks for the advice though. So the fact he should definitely get 1 element because of coming directly from esa does mean that he is then entitled to lcwra from start of uc claim then I guess
  • calcotti
    calcotti Community member Posts: 10,010 Disability Gamechanger
    Can you answer the question - Has he received any message from DWP through UC journal advising him when he is being treated as having LCWRA from?
    Information I post is for England unless otherwise stated. Rules may be different in other parts of UK.
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    Yes, they said this, after I asked for the back payment and told them it should be from start of claim:

    the UC decision maker has now made a revised decision to award LCWRA from '12 November 2020' onwards; I have emailed them back to confirm whether this November date is correct or should the award apply from August 2020; so when I hear more we will update yourselves on this.
    
    All I can do in the meantime is to pay the arrears for November 2020 to April 2021 which will credit into bank account on Monday 19 April 2021. 
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    You have to scroll to see it, unsure why
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    But the tribunal decision was lcwra from start of claim in August 
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    But if the lcwra rate was paid from Nov, it would be approx £1000 backdated, but they have paid only 600 and I saw they removed the lcw money from Aug sep and Oct that he was paid, so that's why the backdated amount is so low too
  • calcotti
    calcotti Community member Posts: 10,010 Disability Gamechanger
    edited April 2021
    I think possibly they have treated your submission 'in October kind of time' as a notification of a change of circumstances and therefore applied the decision from that date (which would be correct). There is no waiting period because he already had LCW so the LCWRA element is payable from that assessment period.

    Removing the LCW element from the previous periods is then, most likely, an administrative error which can be addressed by reminding them that he was previously paid ESA WRAG component (if that is the case) and should therefore have the LCW element included up the point where it is replaced by the LCWRA element.

    If there is indeed a tribunal decision saying LCWRA should apply from August then the LCWRA element will, I think, be payable from the start of the UC claim (because previously ESA LCW).


    Information I post is for England unless otherwise stated. Rules may be different in other parts of UK.
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    Oh I see, maybe that's the reason then. I'm guessing he will still win the full amount when the judge looks at it again though. The lady from appeal and tribunal place earlier today told me that the day after the appeal was allowed, the dwp lodged the lapsed payment, so now the judge will look at it and decide which decision is most beneficial for the claimant, but no time frame.

    But worst case scenario like you said he should still of got the lcw rate from start of claim and not had it removed. Guess it's out of my hands now. Dwp make everything so complex! 
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    Looking back at the uc journal, on 14th November whilst the mandatory reconsideration was being processed, they put a thing on the to do list saying need to declare health problems so on the journal it states its new health problems declared then as an entry.

    However when he first transfered to uc from esa they asked him at that time about his health conditions too, so the same conditions are noted in the original uc award claim from August last year, in the documents the dwp sent us
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    So the same health conditions were logged on his original uc application when I filled it out for him to apply for uc in first place
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    Thanks so much for all your help by the way, it's much appreciated 
  • calcotti
    calcotti Community member Posts: 10,010 Disability Gamechanger
    I would suggest that he posts an additional note in the payment section of the journal along the following lines (assuming he was receiving the WRAG component of ESA at the time of transfer).

    I am aware that there is an outstanding query regarding whether the LCWRA decision should apply from 12th November 2020 or from the start of my UC claim. However, in the meantime, I wish to point out that the revised statements for the payments made in xxxxx, xxx and xxx are definitely incorrect. These statements now include neither the LCW element nor the LCWRA element. As I was receiving the WRAG component of ESA at the time I claimed UC I am entitled to at least the LCW element in each of those months.
    Information I post is for England unless otherwise stated. Rules may be different in other parts of UK.
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    Okay will do thank you.
  • harvey119
    harvey119 Community member Posts: 19 Listener
    What do you think about the new health conditions declared entry on the 14th November? They put that in the to do list then so I filled it in for him, but the conditions were the same as what we told them when submitting the uc claim in the first place, so they were aware of them in August at start of claim

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