× Search rightsnet
Search options

Where

Benefit

Jurisdiction

Jurisdiction

From

to

Forum Home  →  Discussion  →  Disability benefits  →  Thread

Does the Disability Benefit Centre notify ESA sections of DLA stopping?

Ken Butler
forum member

Disability Rights UK

Send message

Total Posts: 229

Joined: 16 June 2010

Does anyone know whether it’s been established - say via a FOI request - if the DWP Disability Benefit Centre automatically notifies ESA sections if a claimant’s DLA entitlement ends?

I’ve been looking at overpayment case law and can’t see that this has ever come up.

Edmund Shepherd
forum member

Tenancy Income, Royal Borough of Greenwich, London

Send message

Total Posts: 508

Joined: 4 December 2013

I have a dim recollection that there is a case from way back that revealed that a slip of paper or chit was sent to the Income Support department from the Disability Benefits Centre but not actioned and therefore the resulting overpayment was not recoverable. Sorry, I don’t recall anything more than that; it came up during a CPAG training course some years ago, so I may be mis-remembering. It was in the context of Hinchy and B v SSWP, I think.

Daphne
Administrator

rightsnet writer / editor

Send message

Total Posts: 3537

Joined: 14 March 2014

Hinchy - http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/caselaw/item/recovery-of-overpayments - says -

‘The claimant is not concerned or entitled to make any assumptions about the internal administrative arrangements of the department. In particular, she is not entitled to assume the existence of infallible channels of communication between one office and another.’

And B - http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/caselaw/item/overpayment-recovery-and-whether-disclosure-of-a-material-fact-must-be-reas - says if you’re specifically told to disclose something then you must.

But I think there is an argument along the lines that you can’t fail to disclose something they already know. Nowadays the computers in the ESA processing centres include info about what disability benefits the claimant gets. A lot of the caselaw seems to pre-date the level of modern technology…

Ken Butler
forum member

Disability Rights UK

Send message

Total Posts: 229

Joined: 16 June 2010

Hi Daphne,

Thanks.

That’s the angle I want to see if I can go on -that the ESA section would have been notified by the DBC of the client’s DLA ending so the client cannot be said to have f’ailed to disclose’ this.

Edmund Shepherd
forum member

Tenancy Income, Royal Borough of Greenwich, London

Send message

Total Posts: 508

Joined: 4 December 2013

There you are, Daphne is the font of all knowledge. I think I’d got stuck on the argument the appellant was making and took it out of context. Sorry if I confused matters.

Best of luck with it, I agree with Daphne that the caselaw is old and even DWP IT architecture has improved since then.

Daphne
Administrator

rightsnet writer / editor

Send message

Total Posts: 3537

Joined: 14 March 2014

Not sure about that Edmund - only cut and pasted the news stories ;) and if it was a course in the dim and distant past you may have been thinking about Hinchy at the Court of Appeal stage - http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/caselaw/item/landmark-ruling-on-recovery-of-overpayments - which went the other way. But I think we’re saying the same thing anyway.

Ken - it’s not so much as they send notification - it’s just the computer system is shared - but if they have it, they have it! Let us know how you get on…

Ros
Administrator

editor, rightsnet.org.uk

Send message

Total Posts: 1323

Joined: 6 June 2010

I think Edmund might have been thinking about CG/5631/1999 where Tribunal of Commissioners found that there was no recoverable overpayment where there were computer links between DWP depts (that’s the one I remember) -

http://www.administrativeappeals.tribunals.gov.uk/aspx/view.aspx?id=977

However, in CIS/2710/2008, Judge Ward says that’s no longer good law following B v SSWP -

http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/caselaw/item/Overpayment-failure-to-disclose-to-local-office-that-entitlement-to-carers-

Ken Butler
forum member

Disability Rights UK

Send message

Total Posts: 229

Joined: 16 June 2010

Hi Ros,

Thanks a lot for this.

Not good news at all.

But it has saved me a lot of scrambling around as well as a FOI request.