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Cannot make or manage claim online at all
Apologies if this is a silly question but we can’t seem to get an answer. We have full service arriving November/December. We know now that there will be a significant number of social care clients who will never be able to make an online claim or manage a claim online. It’s not a question of providing them with the means to do so and teaching them how to use the internet. They will never be able to do so. They do not lack capacity and will not have an appointee and our Deputyship team will definitely not be taking people on just to manage UC claims.
This must be happening in full service areas now. What is DWP doing about such claimants? If they do manage to get a UC claim up and running what happens about keeping it going?
Definitely not a silly question! I got told by my stakeholder contact in UC yesterday that a phone claim should be made (they use a contingency email address to set it up - see https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/13233/) -and then any subsequent dealings should be done via the UC helpline. Whether this works or not I would like to know!
I guess they should also ask for any communications by letter.
I’d be really interested to hear how you get on with this - I think failure to make reasonable adjustments may be something that will need challenging through the courts…
DWP claim that there are appropriately trained staff within jobcentres who can assist those who have issues with accessing, understanding IT.
Our local jobcentre has, on the occasions when I have faced this situation with new claims, been as helpful as they can, even extending to sitting with the client and going through the claim with them ,and entering all the details for them. I can’t speak for maintaining ongoing claims, as I have not yet been referred any clients with insurmountable issues in this area. My experience is that there is usually (among my clients, at least) a friend or family member who can assist.
We submitted a FOI request (https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/494339/response/1193936/attach/2/FoI 2966 reply.pdf?cookie_passthrough=1)
- about this very issue as there seems to be in the DWP a combination of an underestimation of the numbers of people who will struggle to maintain a UC award online (for a variety of reasons) plus a naivety about the amount of support that is available “out there”.
We asked:
“How is a claimant who is unable to use the internet (either because of mental or physical disabilities, or other limiting factors such as isolated rural location with no internet, or through having been legally barred from internet access) given assistance from DWP in managing their online claim?
There is plenty of information about help with claiming online, but I cannot find anything that explains how such a claimant would be given assistance from DWP to check their journal for notifications (or receive notifications in a different format), check their award details, communicate with their work coach, etc. Not everyone can easily obtain an appointee (and in some cases this would not be possible or appropriate); not everyone has friends/family to assist. I cannot believe that DWP would do regular home visits.
Please provide the regulations or guidance that describes who would provide this assistance and procedurally how it would work. “
The DWP responded:
” I confirm that the Department holds no recorded information to answer your request. However, to be helpful you may find the following explanation useful. This has however been provided outside our obligations under the Freedom of Information regime There will always be people for whom engaging with us digitally is not a feasible proposition. As a result, a Freephone telephone helpline and face to face support are also available for claimants to make and manage a Universal Credit claim. Where needed, the Work Coach will provide the claimant with a written note to remind them of the date of their next appointment, especially if the claimant has difficulty accessing or using online services. A home visit can also be arranged to support a claimant in making their initial claim and completing any other administrative tasks required to ensure the claimant receives the correct payment on time.
Visiting officers are available for vulnerable claimants. Many legacy benefits require a visit to a jobcentre to complete a claim. Once a claim is underway it can be maintained by Freephone.
As the information you seek is not held by the Department we will not be processing your request further. “
So…. freephone, written notes to remind of appointment date, and that’s about it. Unless “and completing any other administrative tasks required to ensure the claimant receives the correct payment on time ” means a visiting officer will be sent every time someone needs help!!
Thank you all for these helpful answers. We forsee significant problems with this. A lot of these clients won’t be able to use the helpline either because they will either give up when they can’t get through, won’t understand what to ask or won’t understand what they are being told.
Daphne, I agree about the probable need to challenge failure to make reasonable adjustments. It’s also very frustrating trying to get DWP to understand that someone may well be found to have capacity under a MCA assessment but still not be able to cope with the exigencies of a UC claim.
Benny - these are not people who will be able to go into a Jobcentre to ask for help either. However tempted we may be to send them there..
mycatismo - I reckon VOs are the way to go for new claims but I doubt we’d be popular requesting visits to maintain claims as well! I believe DWP have extremely unrealistic expectations of what social care staff will be able to do in these cases so we need to find a way of managing those expectations, certainly before managed migration hits.
I totally agree that the DWP have unrealistic expectations about the amount of help available to vulnerable clients. Indeed I remember attending a meeting at which it was suggested that we (a team of 4 WROs), manage our vulnerable client’s claims for them. Our workload would make this utterly impossible, and in my view, would not be appropriate in any case.
I also agree that the department has badly underestimated the number of people who will require assistance with the online service. The frontline JCP staff, who already have experience of the client-base, are more realistic, and up to a point are willing to offer what help they are able, but it seems there is a big disconnect between them and the higher echelons, who simply don’t seem to want to acknowledge any issues.
Agree completely .
Our experience is that DWP is big on talk, less so on delivery and it all falls upon Jobcentre staff to do what they can while their higher-ups boast loudly of total success.
Responses to cases where the client cannot make or maintain an online claim, especially when they can’t use the phone either, have been patchy at best, and there has often been a ‘pressure wave’ as DWP tries not to provide help itself but pushes and presses for someone,anyone, else to do what is needed.
There is now (limited) provision for VOs but we are told that any delay between the request for a VO and the making of an application is just tough luck and they won’t consider the claim date being the date on which help is requested. We’re going to challenge that.
Our Jobcentres have Complex Needs policies in place but DWP has refused to share them for unspecified legal reasons - we got them through FoI but most are skeletal, one or two are completely blank. One seems very detailed and thought-through. The differences between the plans are deeply worrying.
We have asked repeatedly what support is available to those who need help throughout their claim and not just with getting it started- silence has always followed.
I would say that DWP has gradually improved in this area, but that’s just not good enough; the fact that they had no plan at all prior to starting all this shenanigans is simply a scandal.
[ Edited: 31 Aug 2018 at 09:50 am by Andrew Dutton ]‘The mental health charity Mind has also raised concerns that ministers have failed to put enough support in place to help vulnerable people move on to the new system, and that hundreds of thousands were at risk of slipping through the net.’
but it seems there is a big disconnect between them and the higher echelons, who simply don’t seem to want to acknowledge any issues.
probably because the front line staff are more than aware of the issues from their personal lives etc, where the higher echelons assume that everyone lives like them, has no issues with crap internet access/inability to deal with tech etc…..hence, of course, the total reliance on online for everything, which is NEVER going to work…
I couldn’t agree more. Total online service was an unrealistic expectation from day one. Unfortunately it is vulnerable claimants who are paying the price for the failure of those high up in the DWP to recognise this.