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

New conversion notice

Damian
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Welfare rights officer - Salford Welfare Rights Service

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Total Posts: 211

Joined: 16 June 2010

I don’t know if I’m actually the last one to come accross this but the DWP now have a new conversion notice which seems to comply with reg 4 of the conversion regs - dated last month: IBM350 08/12. They’ve pretty much scooped up s1(3) of the WRA and put that in there along with the sentance “If these conditions are not satisfied your existing benefit will not be converted to ESA and will stop”. It might be arguable that more explanation is needed (no mention of descriptors or what the phrase “limited capability for work” means but I think it would be a lot harder to convince a tribunal that it is not valid. Still I am going to show a copy to all the tribunals for my outstanding conversion appeals as I think it makes the argument that the old letter was not valid stronger.

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Martin Williams
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Welfare rights advisor - CPAG, London

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Joined: 16 June 2010

Thanks for this Damian.

Here is a link to the thread about the potential significance of the earlier version of the conversion notices:

http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/1944/

I have not thought in detail about the contents of the new version but it seems to me that:

1. It is much more likely to be accepted as meeting the requirements of the regulations.

and

2. Advisers may wish to say in appeals where the new version of the notice was not served before the decision ending the IS/IB or SDA that the new notice gives an example of how the requirement could be met and demonstrates perfectly the inadequacies of the previous notice.

3. Remember as well that if the conversion decision in a particular case was taken BEFORE the claimant was given the new notice then section 12(8)(b) SSA 1998 means the new notice cannot be taken into account by the tribunal.

Martin.

Sorry- I have attached the new notice which Damian sent me.

[ Edited: 14 Sep 2012 at 12:53 pm by Martin Williams ]

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