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ideas wanted on how to improve the PIP process and deal with delays
The disability benefits consortium have identified solicitors interested in legally challenging the DWP about delays in PIP claims and they are interested in suggestions on any of the following –
• (1) how to improve the PIP application process (without jeopardising the quality of decision making),
• (2) how to best provide applicants with interim support during the waiting period (e.g. interim payments for those who are likely to qualify?), and
• (3) how best to compensate applicants for long waiting periods (e.g. compensation, not just backdated payments?).
If anyone has any suggestions please email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) and I will feed the suggestions in.
(1) Use the DLA procedure of one clerical form rather than having one form completed over the phone and one clerical form.
(2) This is a non-starter in my opinion. If they are likely to qualify, they should be awarded the money without a medical.
(3) Interest to be paid on backdated amounts. If a client has incurred overdraft fees, bank charges etc, these to be paid for by the PIP department.
My frivolous reply is simple; start paying the assessors enough to attract recruitment!
£40 a pop for 2 hours’ work including travel is nonsense; the system was built to fail.
How do
Daphne’s on holiday and I could do with a quick chat about this. Anyone else from DBC I could speak to or has Daphne got ownership?
Cheers
not on holiday here dan :) - nawra email goes to my bristol address and have just seen your email - I will forward it to DBC and copy you in
In a recent partnership meeting with DWP, a lad called Matthew from North Tyneside CAB requested the possibility of staggering the lump sum of backdated payments to make money management easier on the claimant rather than one big arrears payment.
DWP said ‘unlikely’.
Food for thought, anyway…
Make it possible for an adviser to phone up and log the claim and have a form sent out. Would save eveyone a lot of time. Make claim forms easier to get.
Comitment that claims must be decided within a set period of time.
Make it possible for an adviser to phone up and log the claim and have a form sent out. Would save eveyone a lot of time.
It would also make the scheme more accessible for people with cognitive or mental health problems that place a bar on their using a phone.
I’ve just tried to phone to make a claim under the special rules and their computers are not working. It would be nice to be able to phone and secure the date of claim without having to phone every hour to see if their computers are up yet :-)
Make it possible for an adviser to phone up and log the claim and have a form sent out. Would save eveyone a lot of time.
It would also make the scheme more accessible for people with cognitive or mental health problems that place a bar on their using a phone.
No to mention all those who have had a laryngectomy, are deaf or have breathing problems that affect their ability to carry on a conversation over the phone. Add in those folk who can’t afford (and/or have had outgoing calls barred from their phone for non payment) and there’s quite a chunk of folk who have the need for the benefit that can’t access a way to make a claim.
We have now had a couple of people who seem to have been delayed because of the ‘verification’ process
Also an odd situation where i rang to help a young women claim ( just coming to 16 new claim) she didnt know her NI number but PIP quoted it to her and mum confirmed it
The delayed people in 2 cases were male in mid late 50s and had never claimed anything before and one a women who had not had children and until recently been married
In the three later cases they did the application over the phone for the form , were booked appt to complete a few weeks later then didnt have the form when reminded about the appt to complete
On calling PIP it appeared the form had got held up as they ‘couldnt validate’ the claimant but had dont nothing to attempt to do so ( like call them or ask for further information)
I have never understood why it was necessary to restrict access to the claiming process. After all, the old DLA claim packs used to work fine and were readily available. Seems the DWP work on the basis of “if it aint broke, break it now.”
Mind, imagine the chaos had all the clients previously mentioned been able to submit claims. Even longer delays!
Really, if we want to improve the claiming process for any benefit, the first answer is to put someone in charge at the DWP who has the faintest idea of how to run a drunken celebration in a beer factory!
Give the DWP ownership of the entire claims process, rather than the DWP effectively having their hands tied once the claim has been sent to the provider. Decision Makers/Case Managers should be able to decide a claim without sending it to the provider if a PIP2 with good supporting evidence is provided at the outset. They should also be able to decide a claim if additional evidence is provided to the DWP after the claim has been sent to the provider but before the provider has made an assessment.