Late Bedroom Tax appeals or review? What to do?

just canvassing an opinion, I came into my post many months after Bed Tax introduced, so now finding people who never appealled the decision back in April. Since then there has been many successful appeals on , size, storage of equipment , disabled partners needing seperate rooms and even children who visit absent parents on a weekend.

I am meeting people who mirror the above circumstances, but were told there was nothing they could do but accept what the law has changed and accept what it states. So do I go for a late appeal, though the absolute 13 month deadline to appeal is creeping closer, or do I request an anytime review on official error, or both to cover all the bases. Opinions welcome.

I see no reason not to put in late appeals. I think they are likely to be accepted, given the circumstances.

I can’t see that there has been any official errors in the majority of cases, although there may be some, so I doubt that tactic will get far.

Remeber there will be many new HB decisions issued along with benefit uprating in the next month or so, and there may well be decisions as a result of rent increases as well. At worst these can then be appealed in time

There is an absolute 13 month time limit to appeal those decisions , but there is also no right of appeal against refusal to revise for official error if the decision was made more than 13 months ago [R(IS)15/04]

You are therefore far better off going down the route of a late appeal because the Council can revise the decision anyway before the appeal is determiend by a tribunal, but if you go for revision for oficial error and the council refuse you could then find yourself outside the 13 month time limits and with no prospect of making the council justify itself to a Tribunal.  The only option then would be Judicial Review with little chance of success and probably no legal aid in the first place

thanks for that i had forgootten the councils have the right to refuse review and no appeal. Striaght appeal it is. Thank you both for your inputs