Client puts in renewal claim for WTC including disability element.
Receives in post DWP IB50 form (PCA) direct from Medical Services with letter explaining its purpose is to find out about the sort of work he is doing.

Client is clear he no longer gets IB, but is doing a full week of around 37 hours.
We have no sight of cover letter yet (phone enquiry), but client says the letter does not refer to any specific benefit. No phone number either in the letter for enquiries)

Our immediate feeling was "is this a JCP error resulting from former IB claim not being deleted correctly" or, is this a new HMRC policy, as (a) he is working a full week (and why not?), (b) the IB50 descriptors fit the WTC disability criteria, (c) the country is bankrupt and the Treasury must be leaning heavily on every department.

Anyone else had this yet, or is it a cockup? Have asked client to call Medical Services (gave him the number) to ascertain which organisation triggered the IB50.

I noticed that last year on Rightsnet (see link below) the question was posed as to how eligibility was determined,but received a limited response. Maybe this is HMRC's response!

http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=3036&mesg_id=3036&page=4

I've never seen this.

As far as I know the claim simply asks a claimant to tick a box if they want a DE and directs them to the notes novel where the disability conditions are set out.

Some of them mirror the PCA descriptors but some of them are much wider than the scope of the PCA. I would therefore be quite wary of returning the questionnaire on it's own or without paying particular regard to the DE disability criteria.

I don't think its unreasonable for HMRC to want to seek this information, but I do think its unreasonable for this happen using the IB50 becuase it is not designed for the purpose and doesn't seek all the relevant types of information. It would be all too easy for someone who completed the IB50 in this way to erroneously lose entitlement to the DE.

I hope this doesn't become common practice.