Very interesting decision CH/392/2009, confirming that, a) the date of claim for HB is the date that the guarantee element of PC is awarded from (as long as the claim is received by LA within 1 month of the PS decision) and b) the further backdating provisions beyond the date of claim (now 3 months, previously a year).

This LA got it wrong, and likely has been doing so since PC introduced. Worth checking if your LA's are doing the same. Could amount to vast sums and need to ask the LA's to trawl through awards made since 2004.

I have emailed copy to rightsnet and asked that they post it on the site.

"Could amount to vast sums and need to ask the LA's to trawl through awards made since 2004."

For pension age awards / claims, it would be October 2003.

nice result andy ....

there's a summary of the decision in rightsnet briefcase @

CH/392/2009 — Start of entitlement to council tax benefit following award of pension credit

... and the full decison is available @ http://www.administrativeappeals.tribunals.gov.uk/aspx/view.aspx?id=2745

A bit surprised this hasn't generated more discussion. On picking through Jacobs' reasoning I can now see what should have been happening and it is at odds with my previous interpretation (and all my colleagues') and just about everyone else's I've spoken to. Presumably we all placed too much emphasis on what we understood to be the policy intention rather than looking at what the regs say!

My question is how do get around the anti-test case rule?

Apparently, so "sources" suggest, the DWP has only recently become aware of this decision and are looking at the "implications".