Incapacity Benefit Review in Spain

PINGA14

Just wanted to add my experience of incapacity benefit.
I sent my form in filled in with a huge amount of detail, dialysis 5 days a week, low/high blood pressure, arthritis and much more!
They still failed me and I had to appeal. I won the appeal but still get called in for medicals periodically. I just can't understand how the system keeps calling me for these medicals. The last one I had, the doctor was amazed that I had been called and had a row with someone on the phone about it. He filled the questionaire himself and said he never wanted to see me in the department again cos I should have been there!!!!

I filled in the form completely so I just cant understand why I keep getting called?????

SMC_2

PINGA14 wrote:

Just wanted to add my experience of incapacity benefit.
I sent my form in filled in with a huge amount of detail, dialysis 5 days a week, low/high blood pressure, arthritis and much more!
They still failed me and I had to appeal. I won the appeal but still get called in for medicals periodically. I just can't understand how the system keeps calling me for these medicals. The last one I had, the doctor was amazed that I had been called and had a row with someone on the phone about it. He filled the questionaire himself and said he never wanted to see me in the department again cos I should have been there!!!!

I filled in the form completely so I just cant understand why I keep getting called?????

I know it is so frustrating, we do our best and give them honest and clear information but it isn't good enough. Not sure what else we can do.

seven-day-weekend

**UPDATE**

Well, the questionnaire arrived last week,but before it arrived my husband had had a recurrence of a condition that he has had treatment for in the UK. So, we had to register with the Doctor. He was great (although the language problem IS still a problem). He put my husband down as suffering from IBS, depression, rheumatism and epididymal cysts ( the recurring condition). He made him an appointment to see a urologist and my husband saw this specialist last week - two weeks after we'd registered with our village Doctor. He has to see him again in February after some X-Rays.

We asked our Doctor today to fill in his section on the questionnaire (which was bilingual) and he wrote an essay-length report on the back and was extremely kind and concerned. He has prescribed drugs for the depression and the IBS so my husband can get them free.

Anyway, we have photocopied all the hospital appointments and the prescriptions and filled in a health descriptors and scores sheet that we found on the internet and are sending the whole lot back today with the completed questionnaire. Hopefully now a Doctor has signed the forms my husband will not need a medical and his claim can continue. Let's hope so.

I will update as soon as I know any more.

krisskross

Glad it is all working out for you. When we went to live in Spain my husband was claiming IB as well. Happily it had previously been decided that he never needed to attend a medical. After a couple of years he was 65 so changed to SRP.

Many people think you cannot claim any benefits if you go to live abroad. I only know of Incapacity Benefit and State Retirement Pension. Wonder if there are any more.

seven-day-weekend

There are some more, can't remember what they are now.

Oh yes....winter fuel allowance is one, if you were eligible for it before you left the UK.

Really useful in Lanzarote!

seven-day-weekend

krisskross wrote:

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Many people think you cannot claim any benefits if you go to live abroad. I only know of Incapacity Benefit and State Retirement Pension. Wonder if there are any more.

We assumed he would lose his IB when we came here and it was only because my husband's headmaster told him about someone he knew who claimed IB in the Algarve that we asked about it.

My husband was just going to cancel his claim! :eek:

neenaw_4

max, thank you so much for your informative posts. i had no idea doctors did that! how exactly do GPs "annotate" the sick notes? :eek:

SMC_2

neenaw wrote:

max, thank you so much for your informative posts. i had no idea doctors did that! how exactly do GPs "annotate" the sick notes? :eek:

There are various sick lines a GP can use, there is the normal MED3 and then the MED4 which can be asked for when someone is filling in an IB50.

There are several other MED forms that a GP can fill in and send to the agency themself, they wouldn't give them to the patient. One they can use that basically tells the job centre they don't think their patient is really ill and so they will start investigating.

There is another a GP can send direct to the job centre where he/she can give them more information or the real reason they have signed the person off, sometimes a GP feels it harmful to write a particular phrase on a patients sick line.

neenaw_4

wow.

i think that's quite a cop-out on the doctor's part. if he/she doesn't think the patient is ill then they shouldn't fill out a med3 surely?

my goodness. i'm quite shocked.

SMC_2

neenaw wrote:

wow.

i think that's quite a cop-out on the doctor's part. if he/she doesn't think the patient is ill then they shouldn't fill out a med3 surely?

my goodness. i'm quite shocked.

Well in this day and age when people can be quite threatening with doctors when they try to refuse to sign someone off then I can understand a doctor giving them a MED3 and then sending in the other form.

Equally sometimes they will deal with patients who don't believe they are better when they are and so by asking the job centre to ask the claimaint for more information, that can make the person realise they are able to get back to work.