1.6 million PIP claims to be reviewed

Billy Durrant - 23 July 2018 10:38 AM

Going back to the original theme, has anyone had a case reviewed yet?

I’ve only this morning had an MRN on a supersession that had resulted in nil entitlement at first, it also revised the earlier award decision to include standard mob claiming it was part of the review

An update from stakeholders’ forum yesterday on the LEAP exercise -

DWP have started work on the LEAP exercise to trawl for claimants who may have been underpaid following the decisions in MH v SSWP (PIP) [2016] UKUT 531(AAC) and RJ, GMcL and CS v SSWP (PIP) [2017] UKUT 105 (AAC) on interpreting personal independence payment (PIP) mobility activity 1. DWP guidance gives information on how the different judgment dates will impact of the effective dates of review decisions.

Due to a shortage of staff – and the fact that they need to train staff – it is going to be a very gradual roll out with letters going out to the general population from 24 september. It is likely the whole exercise will take at least two years.

Letters refer to a review due to ‘a change in law’ and, we are told, will confirm to the claimant that their award cannot reduce as a result of this review which is limited to the specific criteria in the judgments above.

Following the review, decision letters will go out whether the award is changed or not, and giving rights of mandatory reconsideration and appeal.

We asked whether claimants could put themselves forward for the review ahead of receiving the letter and still be guaranteed no reduction in award but the DWP were unable to answer that currently although they said they would get back to us.

Like many people I am now dealing with reviews of decisions made in the period April 2017 to March 2018 - i.e. when the phrase “For reasons other than psychological distress” was attached to descriptors 1(c), 1 (d) and 1 (f).  I was wondering how this would work out - I was envisaging the FtT having to interpret the legislation as it was written at the time and then wait for the DWP to later “trawl” and reassess the client.  However, my reading of the June guidance in the ADM Memo 16 to 18 is that it is actually very straightforward.  The amendments in SI 194/2017 were quashed by RF vSSWP so they should simply be removed and when we interpret Mobility Activity 1 we do so following MH v SSWP.  Is this correct? 

I

https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/news/item/around-1000-qualifying-claimants-have-received-pip-arrears-payments-since
So they have reviewed 140,000 cases so far and made an award in 1,000 of them.
0.71%.
Really?

... meanwhile, in Northern Ireland, where the same exercise is underway, 400 payments have been made after clearing 10,900 cases by the end of November.
https://www.communities-ni.gov.uk/news/department-responds-dwp-ministerial-statement-personal-independence-payment-pip

Just had a call from a mother - her daughter aged 19 with autism has been contacted by DWP stating that they made a mistake with her current award (due to run to 2020) and have booked her in for a face to face assessment in 8 days.  The daughter doesn’t want to proceed with the mobility review as this was not awarded and she only has occasional anxiety so would not score sufficient points for the mobility component.  Her PIP was awarded in 2015.

Her concern is that if she fails to attend the assessment will this stop her entire claim?  She has no plans on attending.
Can she ask PIP to stop the mobility reassessment as she doesn’t want to have this part reviewed?

Does anyone have any experience of this?  Earlier in this thread there was an acknowledgement that no award would be reduced but also that there wouldn’t be any assessments!!

Thanks as always!

Has anyone had recent experience of supporting a client who has had their claim reviewed in relation to the judgement in RF?

I work in the campaigns team at Mind and we’re looking to get a better understanding of what’s been happening in practice over the last few months. The main things we’re looking to find out are what the quality of decisions has been like, and also how onerous the evidence requirements have been for people who are asked to provide extra evidence as part of the review.

I’d be really grateful if anyone has any insights they can share either on here or by email on .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

I’ve just seen the first written confirmation of an MH review. Claimant scored 15 points for daily living, all for mental health, 4 for mobility. She clearly cannot go out without her mother. Not changed on review simply because ‘the threshold is a very high one’. No explanation of why her circumstances don’t meet this threshold.

My client has just showed me this letter received in connection with the review. Of note, it does not give MR/appeal rights info other than the rather odd statement that “if you think your award could be affected by these changes in PIP law, please phone or write to us.” I thought that this was the purpose of the review?

BC Welfare Rights - 29 November 2019 11:34 AM

My client has just showed me this letter received in connection with the review. Of note, it does not give MR/appeal rights info other than the rather odd statement that “if you think your award could be affected by these changes in PIP law, please phone or write to us.” I thought that this was the purpose of the review?

Is there any way this approach by DWP could be challenged on wider discrimination grounds?

Seems highly unfair, when you are reviewing claims based around mental health issues, to put the onus on the claimant to action something which they likely have a limited understanding of, and may even be completely unable to deal with.

Va1der - 29 November 2019 12:05 PM

BC Welfare Rights - 29 November 2019 11:34 AM

My client has just showed me this letter received in connection with the review. Of note, it does not give MR/appeal rights info other than the rather odd statement that “if you think your award could be affected by these changes in PIP law, please phone or write to us.” I thought that this was the purpose of the review?

Is there any way this approach by DWP could be challenged on wider discrimination grounds?

Seems highly unfair, when you are reviewing claims based around mental health issues, to put the onus on the claimant to action something which they likely have a limited understanding of, and may even be completely unable to deal with.

The onus would be on them in any event - whether expressed as a need to request revision or as “call us up for a chat”.

The consequence of DWP not including a statement regarding reconsideration in a decision letter is that the mandatory reconsideration requirement does not apply and an appeal can be lodged directly without the need to jump through that hoop.

Are they thinking, perhaps, that as they have not made a revision or supersession decision, there is nothing to MR? Or is it that this actually is a reconsideration notice, and so the next step would be appeal in any case? I suspect they think it’s the former - as in the latter case, they would surely be telling people about their right to appeal to the tribunal.

Timothy Seaside - 29 November 2019 12:34 PM

Are they thinking, perhaps, that as they have not made a revision or supersession decision, there is nothing to MR? Or is it that this actually is a reconsideration notice, and so the next step would be appeal in any case? I suspect they think it’s the former - as in the latter case, they would surely be telling people about their right to appeal to the tribunal.

The cases I have seen have included a statement about the ability to request an MR.

Looking at the dates may give us a clue - the PDF above appears to relate to a case where PIP was awarded from 12 February 2018; whereas the MH and RJ decisions were 28 November 2016 and 9 March 2017 - so pre-date the claim/decision in this case.

s.27 SSA would have no impact on a case like that. If the original decision failed to take account of RJ and MH, then that is just garden variety error of law/official error and the original decision needs to be revised. But since it wasn’t wrong in those terms, it hasn’t been revised. And there is no right of appeal against a refusal to conduct an any time revision.

Whereas in cases where decisions were made prior to MH and RJ, the effect of s.27 SSA is that the DWP pretends the decisions were correct in law so they don’t need revising. Instead they need to be superseded from either 28.11.16 or 09.03.17 on the basis of the law as then declared. There is a right of appeal against a refusal to supersede, so DWP send out a letter advising of the need to request MR.

That’s my best guess anyway.

Apologies for the poor quality attachment. This appears to be a MH/RG Review letter but rather than saying ‘we have reviewed your claim and not changed the decision, blah blah’ it seems to put the onus on the claimant to provide further info to instigate a review in the first place.

“The main health conditions we have on our system indicate your PIP claim(s) are not affected by these changes… If you think that your PIP claim could be affected by these decisions please phone or write to us”

Has there been any departmental/ministerial announcements that the review is no longer automatically looking at all of the 1.6m decisions, just ones where the main health conditions on the PIP ‘system’ indicate that there might be a problem?

Yes indeed there was - back in February last year - see https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/welfare-rights/news/item/around-28-million-has-been-paid-out-as-a-result-of-pip-review-exercise-following-upper-tribunal-decisions-relating-to-psychological-distress-and-carrying-out-activities-safely...  Those considered less likely to be entitled to increased benefit will be ‘given an opportunity to request a review’