I have a customer with an IB appeal that, hopefully, we can win. In the meantime however he has been issued with an ESA1 form and, if successful, would likely meet the NI contribution conditions for this as he is with the 8 week (or is that 12 week?) linking period. He was last regarded as incapable of work in mid December 2009.

As the customer currently has no income should I advise him to claim ESA anyway to get some benefit?

I am concerned that if the ESA claim fails then a successful IB appeal would only result in the customer being paid up until the day before the ESA claim failed? (Whereas if an ESA claim was not made then the IB could be paid without an end date presumably).

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks.

The IB claim will not link with the ESA claim so the linking rules will not be relevant. He can’t claim IB as within 6 months of previous decision but he can claim ESA. Other options can include reduced rate IS whilst appealing or signing on for JSA.

The relevant NI contributions are those which apply for the new ESA claim, it is not linked to his previous IB claim.

If he wins his appeal the ESA claim is superseded by the IB claim and he will continue to get IB regardless of whether his ESA claim was successful or not.