Revision or supersession?

Our client made a renewal claim for DLA last year.  On 12 June 2011 it was decided that he qualified for HRMC and LRCC, effective in September when the previous claim expired.  The client accepted that decision and did nothing.

A few days later the Department sought further advice on his claim from Medical Services, and as a result of that advice wrote to the client on 18 July “changing” the decision to a nil award.  The client appealed that decision, and we are preparing to challenge that decision in the usual way.

However it occurs to me that the “changed” decision may not be valid.  Is it a revision of the decision made on 12 June?  If so, the SoS can only revise decisions on his own initiative within one month of the original decision (D&A Regs reg 3(a)), so he is out of time.  On the other hand, the decision wasn’t effective until September, so should it be treated as a supersession instead?

Any ideas?

Yes, this is a route the Department sometimes use on DLA renewals and periodic reviews under 3(5)(c), subject to the caveat in limb (ii), ending entitlement and also creating (often large) overpayments.  I’ve dealt with quite a few of these.

Revision may have been possible under reg 3(1)(a) as it appears from what you say that the DWP commenced action leading to revision “a few days” after the original decision was made. The revised decision doesn’t have to be made within a month, but the DWP must be able to show that they commenced action that led to the revision within a month, perhaps by referring the case to Medical Services for advice

Grateful thanks to contributors.

I obviously got myself hung up on the revision/supersession issue, rather than considering whether there were other routes to revision.

It’s now clear that the SoS only has to commence action leading to revision within a month, which the papers show did happen in our client’s case.