Making a complaint to dwp/job center

Cpt.Scarlet

You can legally record a phone conversation on a personal phone for your personal usage, you do not need to inform them that they are being recorded.

If you intend to provide it to a third party then you need the consent of the other person.

Jahlove

Another update

After writing a letter of complaint he was told that when he attended the next interview the suspension would be removed. He attended Monday, He rang the ESA hotline the next day to ask if the suspension had been removed and when he could expect payment.And was told the suspension is still in place and if he attended than it can take up to 5 working days ( maybe longer if there is a backlog) for the paper work to arrive from the job center to say he attended, when asked why can't you simply ring the job center to ask if i attended he was told we cant do it over the phone.

This is now the 5th week without a payment.

Does anybody know if he should get some kind of official corespondence in the form of a letter regarding the complaint he made? i have the feeling they just gave him a call back and are not going to officially lodge this complaint on file.

Jahlove

Its been 2 weeks since he attended the interview and he was told the suspension would be removed once he attended, he is now being told they are still waiting for the paper work to say that he attended or there might be a backlog with processing the paperwork!

At what point does this become unreasonable? its been 2 weeks! why can't a simple phone call to the job center to as if he attended be done?

rogerblack

If it is causing financial hardship, there is a seperate appliction for compensation that can (and should) be made.
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/financial-redress-for-maladministration.pdf

Is the 'staff' side of this manual.
Strangely, I can't find a nice customer document for this. I wonder why.

Jahlove

rogerblack wrote: »

If it is causing financial hardship, there is a seperate appliction for compensation that can (and should) be made.
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/financial-redress-for-maladministration.pdf

Is the 'staff' side of this manual.
Strangely, I can't find a nice customer document for this. I wonder why.

Thank you for the above link.

Im still a little bit unsure on how this works tho, from reading the above link am i correct in thinking you can ask for a speical payment under the Department for Work and Pensions’ Special Payment Scheme for any hardship caused?

Do you need any legal representation or court proceeding for this? or isit a case of writing a letter explaining why you believe you should be compensated?

thanks again!

recoverydust

Contact your/his mp outlining the above
Xxx

Jahlove

Well he decided to leave in until the end of this week to give them a chance to sort this but its still not sorted and its friday now. On monday it will be 3 weeks since he took part in the work focused interview and hes still not received a payment.

Will be sending another letter of complaint on Monday and also sending another letter to his local MP, it will be 7 weeks on Monday that he has not received a single payment, for failing to attend a single WIFI which he has already given his reasons for not attending. which should have only resulted in a sanction ie reduced money, but hes had a full suspension that's till in place 7 weeks later and 3 weeks after attending another WIFI

rogerblack

Jahlove wrote: »

Do you need any legal representation or court proceeding for this? or isit a case of writing a letter explaining why you believe you should be compensated?

thanks again!

In principle, this should be considered as a matter of course, during any complaint.
As a start, make it part of your official complaint.

benefitbaby

Hi,
At the same time as complaining and seeking a special payment for maladministration you friend should also make a Subject Access Request (under the Data Protection Act) and request copies of EVERYTHING the DWP hold in relation to his claim, including a CD of all calls he's made and computer screen prints.

This will be mighty helpful to establishing what has been going on behind the scenes and you can use the content to escalate your complaint and to show how bad their service was (helpful for the compensation aspect).

Some ESA computers are being switched over to a new computer system and this has led to a large numbers of delays, errors and problems with payments. You may want to ask your MP to enquire about whether this has happened in your friends case.

Jahlove

Another update

Another letter of complaint was sent via special next day delivery. The day after the letter was delivered he received a letter stating his money would be backdated and the suspension removed.

One letter and it was sorted the very next day, something 2 months of phone calls could not achieve.

My advice is if you have any problems always send letters!

Thank you everybody for all your help and advice, it really did come in useful, i dread to think of all the people who don't know the best way to sort things like this out, if it wasn't for all the advice on here and sending letters directly to the manager who knows how much longer it would have taken for him to get a payment, he had no payment at all for 2 months!