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ESA entitlement when Carer’s Allowance awarded
I have two cases I would like to share with you.
First one, customer has cbESA and in the support group. Makes successful claim for DLA for young daughter, claims CA., awarded as underlying. Contacts DWP to seek a review of ESA and the Carer’s Premium to be added which she knows would be income based. Advised by dept that she should withdraw (stop) her ESA claim and make a claim for Income Support. I advised her to call them back and insist on ESA review to take into consideration the CA. As well as losing her right to a contribution based benefit she would have been worse off under IS as no Disability Premium would have been added.
Second one, customer makes a claim for Income Support following an award of Carer’s Allowance, possibly on the same advice as above. Has PIP so no issue with the disability premium side of things. However, asked to attend JC to discuss his claim. He attends and advises officer that he has health problems as well as caring for his wife 35 hours plus a week. She seeks advice from Manager who helpfully comes to speak to my customer. He advised that they are ‘targeting’ all new carers and can require them to attend JC on a regular basis, even once a week. Advised customer to claim ESA.
What exactly are the departments doing? Is there no understanding of the regs or is it all caught up in the drive for conditionality?
Both I would imagine. Combine those factors with a complete lack of accountability, stand back and watch the carnage.
My favourite one so far was the client who, under similar circumstances (u/e to CA resulted in IR ESA entitlement to top up ongoing CB claim) was told firmly that it wasn’t possible to have both and that if she wanted to claim IR ESA she would have to close down her CB claim and start again.
Second one, customer makes a claim for Income Support following an award of Carer’s Allowance, possibly on the same advice as above. Has PIP so no issue with the disability premium side of things. However, asked to attend JC to discuss his claim. He attends and advises officer that he has health problems as well as caring for his wife 35 hours plus a week. She seeks advice from Manager who helpfully comes to speak to my customer. He advised that they are ‘targeting’ all new carers and can require them to attend JC on a regular basis, even once a week. Advised customer to claim ESA.
I’d be seeking legal advice on this one. “Targetting new carers” feels tremendously discriminatory to me. The relationship between the disabled wife as the person being discriminated against and the husband as IS claimant gives me a headache but it’d be worth getting an opinion.