Appealing an overpayment decision

I’ve been asked to look into an overpayment of ESA by the claimant’s deputy. Having spoken to ESA, it appears the overpayment was from 2014/15 due to capital limits. The deputy does not agree with the reason for overpayment and wants to appeal. As this is now 4 years old, is there any way to appeal the decision?

Thanks

Are there grounds for an any time revision?

Any involvement of an IUC?

I’ll be requesting an any time revision but I don’t know if we have the evidence. No IUC involvement. I’m going to check the notifications for appropriate wording but I think an any time revision is the only option.

You don’t have to have the evidence. They do. It’s possible to get an any time revision off the ground with minimal/skeletal arguments. After that, it’s DWP who have the problem.

Thanks gents. I’m just waiting for the paperwork and i’ll request it.

Mike Hughes - 21 August 2018 08:47 AM

You don’t have to have the evidence. They do. It’s possible to get an any time revision off the ground with minimal/skeletal arguments. After that, it’s DWP who have the problem.

Could you expand a bit on your thinking here Mike? Afaik, if a DWP DM refuses to do an anytime revision because they don’t agree there are grounds, then there’s no right of appeal. How would you look to advance such a case and why would the DWP have the problem?

I’m particularly interested as I’m delivering training for local advisers soon on challenging decisions and this is something we’re going to cover.

Sure. This is an old overpayment which verbally has been relayed as being caused by capital. At this stage, where there’s an IUC, I request a transcription and pick that apart to get grounds (no evidence etc.). Never been a problem because they are usually more comedy than factual/full of incriminating evidence.

Where, as in this case, there’s no IUC I think the initial approach is to ask for information supporting the decision. An explanation plus… if you like

- evidence of a revision before a recoverability decision.
- evidence of grounds for recovery e.g. failure to disclose or misrepresentation. I ask DWP to identify the specific evidence of a failure or misrepresentation. Always a struggle for them if there’s no specific document to rely on or there was but it’s gone.
- evidence of the calculation of the overpayment (bearing in mind the case law around the minimum requirements for this being that it must be understandable to a claimant and consist of more than x - y = z). We need to know what x is.
- whether they were aware there was a deputy and from what date?

Four years down the line much of what DWP had to put this in place (if they ever had much at all) will have been disposed of. It’s not that hard to then construct a request for an any time revision which argues official error or similar if any of the above throw up irregularities. My experience is that they almost always will e.g. the computer system has no evidence of a review/revision before a recoverability decision or the calculation is slightly out.

I think the approach is always to ask what they have first of all and then trip them up afterwards. See here https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/3472 for a previous discussion.

Thanks very much Mike, very helpful.