Online decision notices - no record of revised decisions

Just wanted to flag a UC issue up & seek thoughts…

In our case-
Incorrect elements applied to UC claim from the outset.
Client presents to us several assessment periods in
Revisions requested & quickly revised in client’s favour

All good. However, there is now no record of the previous incorrect decisions. The UC account now just reflects the revised decisions, there is no record of the previous incorrect decisions and the ‘monthly statements’ do not indicate that the decisions have been revised at all.

In our case this caused issues when chasing payments because the telephone operator only had access to the same overwritten decisions so was adamant that there was no payment due - the only information they could see indicated that the correct amount had been in payment from the start of the claim.

So thinking about this a bit more broadly - a claimant gets no notification that a decision has been revised. There is no date attached to the revision decision. The decision does not indicate it is an ‘MR’ decision. Does this give rise to full appeal rights? Clearly it does but how does the claimant know this? Is an appeal going to be accepted? Are DWP going to be able to confirm that the decisions have been revised as required?

Has anybody come across any of these issues? Am hoping someone can allay my fears!

I am busy doing two MR’s of UC decisions that were merely given through the journal. No PDF letter format stating right or MR or appeal or time limits.

I think it is a UC problem and clearly has implications for people who don’t have advisers checking the decisions.

I have come across this several times - on another thread I mentioned an outrageous ‘reason’ given on the Journal for refusing LCWRA - that the claimant already gets Support Group CESA and so the LCWRA element is not payable in UC.

Once challenged, this entry was removed.

As far as I am concerned, this alters the evidence that is available when an appeal is lodged, or when a complaint is made. If we as advisers made our mistakes ‘vanish’ in this manner, we would be in serious trouble. Why should DWP think it is acceptable to wipe out its own errors?

I had a case where the DWP issued a new decision following an MR. The letter posted to the journal made no reference to the MR and just said they owed him money, with no explanation. A letter to the MP referred to the Clt receiving a response to the MR on the date of this new letter, but nothing else. Clt was not happy with this and the fact that his MR was never addressed was one of the grounds of complaint on which we ultimately went to ICE. Clt eventually got an apology and compensatory payment, but this particular issue was never expressly addressed.

Appeal rights never arose in this particular case, but if the DWP is saying that such a letter counts as an MR response then I would argue that appeal rights should be the same as any other MR response.

In general there seems to be a problem with oversimplification of decision notices on UC - letters which just give the bare bones of the decision (if that) and no other information. This seems to be the case particularly with decisions which are fully or partially in the client’s favour, the helpline attitude when you ask for an explanation of a favourable decision seems to be confusion as to why you would care about the process or reasons behind a decision that was in your favour.

Interestingly, just looking at a similar situation now. Client failed WCA whilst on ESA, MR refused then appealed. In the meantime he claimed UC, was referred for a further WCA. Attended UC WCA but before UC decision made, won ESA appeal and placed in WRAG. Before they could award LCW element, made decision based on UC WCA that he did not have LCW. Client applied for MR on basis that UC either hadn’t had regard to ESA tribunal decision, or they should have. After quite a long wait for MR outcome, gets letter on journal about the “outcome of your work capability assessment tribunal”, telling him he has LCW and will be awarded LCW element, with review date based on tribunal recommendation - no reference to MR at all. Whilst client obviously happy that LCW appears to be accepted and LCW element added, I would feel a lot happier if it had actually mentioned changing the decision already made on UC that he didn’t have LCW.

Its the norm for UC!

It’s a nightmare and is common practice. If any of my clients have any decisions they want to dispute I always print a copy of the original one for evidence and this has come in very handy on many occasions.

These “replaced” decisions do not count as MR’s for appeal purposes and do not give right of appeal - just the same “you can request a mandatory reconsideration” jargon at the bottom. The only indicator that the decision is a new one is within this small print right at the end it gives a new date and this is usually after the payment has been made (by several months in most cases) which is a dead giveaway that it’s not the original decision.

I think the DWP think this is an anytime revision rather than an MR so they don’t give appeal rights. I wonder what the record is for the number of anytime revisions on a single decision….......

It’s a nightmare and is common practice. If any of my clients have any decisions they want to dispute I always print a copy of the original one for evidence and this has come in very handy on many occasions.

When I’m giving training I always advise taking a screenshot of every award notice - for those that don’t have access to a printer which many clients won’t

Assuming they could do so, if a claimant were to be caught deleting false statements from their UC Journal and replacing them with post-dated correct facts, what would happen to them?

Just a thought…...