mum sent a letter cancelling benefit

ysoskint

Hello, please can you help us.
My mother in law has schizophrenia along with other health issues. She lives in warden accommodation.

She informed us today that she has enough money and that she does not need her benefit money anymore and therefore she has written to the social security to request that they don't give her anymore money.

My mother in law could not survive without her benefit money. We do not know which benefit she is on, but we are aware that she has no other funds.

My question is, will they stop her benefit on the strength of one letter? Is there anyone we can contact to try and make sure that this does not happen.

My mother in law, although she has her mental health issues, she is aware of when she wants to cause trouble!!! When we try and talk to her about it, she just laughs. It concerns me with the new cuts coming in the benefit system. I genuinely believe that she needs the money and the help she gets. My husband and I work full time and sadly we don't live that close to her to visit and keep on top of her correspondence. FAMILIES!!!! Thanks for your help.

miduck

Social services do not make benefit payments, although they do deal with direct payments - perhaps you could verify what she claims?

Does no one help your MIL with any of this? Perhaps she laughs because it is all she knows how to do in this situation - I imagine it is pretty overwhelming and scary for her, as it is for many vulnerable claimants.

sleepless_saver

You could phone Mind 0300 123 3393 to see what they can advise - your mother is probably not the first person with mental health problems who has done something like this.

ysoskint

She is on the higher rate of disability. She was independent and living alone until around 10 years ago, and then she was found by the police wondering in her nighty when snowing and she was sectioned. Her medication was sorted out and she got the help she neeeded.

When she first moved into sheltered accomm, She used to have a social work but that was cut around a year or so ago.

MIL, although a wonderful person, is very hard to deal with sometimes. My hubby is panicking so much. To be honest we do not know who she wrote to as she is refusing to tell us, she just said that she had written, and knowing from her previous experiences, she will have written.

We just need to make sure that her benefits aren't stopped as she won't tell us and she could end up very vulnerable.

miduck

If you are not sure who she has written to, you need to contact the LA, the DWP and SS. They will not tell you anything, but they can make a note of your call, and hopefully if a letter is received from her they will see the note and act accordingly. They will have seen this happen before, it is more common than you think.

In the longer term you need to look into lasting power of attorney, or at least getting more support for your MIL.

Elvisia

I have this exact problem - my Dad has a stroke which caused him to be unable to process information properly, and he rang up to cancel his attendance allowance as he announced he was fully fit. They refused to let him do it, so I rang them up and asked them to put a note on the system to say the family had to be contacted before changes were made. I only knew this because I spoke to our doctor about it. The Attendance Allowance people said I had to send a letter stating this. So I would call up the relevant parties, and find out if you need to send them a letter. Otherwise you'll need to reclaim again. Dad has threatened to write to them, but he's not well enough to get out of his chair to post the letter, which is somewhat ironic.
This is a common problem, I felt like such a liar when I rang up but the woman was very sympathetic. You feel so daft saying your parents isn't in charge of their faculties and to stop them from stopping their benefits, although my GP said I was being over sensitive about the whole thing.
You may well find that she's written to the wrong people, or hasn't written to anyone at all, as you usually have to do all this sort of thing formally in writing and send it recorded delivery which may be something she's not capable of.