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Forum Home  →  Discussion  →  Work capability issues and ESA  →  Thread

Permitted Work

Hammer
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Online Advice/THT Direct - Terrence Higgins Trust

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Total Posts: 11

Joined: 28 July 2021

I have a client who is doing permitted work. He is currently working within the permitted work rules but there has been a past period where he was working in excess of both the hours and earnings limit.

He has recently been contacted by the DWP – I think as a part of an annual review of his permitted work –  and asked to provide evidence of earnings for the previous 3 months and confirm the number of hours he worked each week…

I have told him that during any week his earnings and/or hours were outside the permitted work limit then there will be an overpayment. Can I also just clarify if he is currently within the rules the DWP will not stop his C-ESA when they review his claim.

unhindered by talent
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Welfare Rights Team, Aberdeenshire Council

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What happened with your client? Client of mine had this situation and a closed period supersession was applied, resulting in an overpayment for the weeks above the SPW limits but a continuation of the claim.

Dan Manville
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Greater Manchester Law Centre

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I would be happy to be corrected about this, but I recall looking at this a few years ago and concluding that the correct outcome was a dead claim, requiring a new claim, and it being prescribed that there could be no linking. That was certainly what happened to my client.

He was a lovely bloke too; a sensible Tribunal Judge clearly thought the same and fixed it for us.

Elliot Kent
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Shelter

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The correct response in these cases is as per the DM in unhindered by talent’s case and the sensible judge in Dan’s case.

Where a person has received benefit for a past period which they weren’t entitled to, but has re-established that entitlement by the time that the decision is actually made, the correct response is to make a closed period supersession; so the award continues but there is an overpayment for the period of disentitlement. It would only be appropriate to end the award in a case where the claimant was still disentitled at the decision date.

This stands as a general principle, but to permitted work cases particularly because of the tendency to report potentially variable wages after the fact. The linking rules do not come into it because there is no new claim required.

See for instance ADM A4180 and elsewhere.