Refused DLA entirely

zudecke

They said he had the option to appeal or for the decision to be reconsidered. He opted for the former and the lady told him she'd send out an appeal form.

I thought the whole appeal process would be over the phone, no?

SandraScarlett

Your friend needs a lot of support, tenacity, and the bit between his teeth, but you can successfully appeal. My friend was frequently told on the phone that her letters hadn't been received, so I did several identical letters of appeal, but with consecutive dates.

It's really important to list every single thing that impacts on your friend's life, and to clearly refute, in writing, any points with which he disagrees.

I did it for my friend by putting:

Your letter states you are able to prepare a meal for herself blah blah blah

The truth is however that I am unable to chop, slice, peel any food, use a knife as I cannot put the pressure required, due to my severe arthritis

It was a v-e-r-y long letter! HTH

xx

Pollycat

SandraScarlett wrote: »

Your friend needs a lot of support, tenacity, and the bit between his teeth, but you can successfully appeal. My friend was frequently told on the phone that her letters hadn't been received, so I did several identical letters of appeal, but with consecutive dates.

It's really important to list every single thing that impacts on your friend's life, and to clearly refute, in writing, any points with which he disagrees.

I did it for my friend by putting:

Your letter states you are able to prepare a meal for herself blah blah blah

The truth is however that I am unable to chop, slice, peel any food, use a knife as I cannot put the pressure required, due to my severe arthritis

It was a v-e-r-y long letter! HTH

xx

That's exactly what I said we did for Mum's appeal (in red) in post #16 a month ago.

They didn't even query it any further, just wrote telling her what they would be paying and from when.

zudecke

SandraScarlett wrote: »

Your friend needs a lot of support, tenacity, and the bit between his teeth, but you can successfully appeal. My friend was frequently told on the phone that her letters hadn't been received, so I did several identical letters of appeal, but with consecutive dates.

It's really important to list every single thing that impacts on your friend's life, and to clearly refute, in writing, any points with which he disagrees.

I did it for my friend by putting:

Your letter states you are able to prepare a meal for herself blah blah blah

The truth is however that I am unable to chop, slice, peel any food, use a knife as I cannot put the pressure required, due to my severe arthritis

It was a v-e-r-y long letter! HTH

xx

Thanks so much .

Similar to how I worded my first post, but a bit more clear and in their language?

Did you do this by hand-written responses? It means I'll have to do it because he can't and I hate writing things by hand haha.

On another note, I'm not really too sure why they agreed to send the appeal letter out, but also offered him the opportunity for a decision maker to phone him "within 48 hrs".. The phone call sounds a bit like a red-herring and I don't want him to get a call and he mistakenly say's the wrong thing and jeopardises the claim/appeal.. I just don't see what the point of a call is?

They actually didn't call within 48 hours anyway, but still..

Pollycat

zudecke wrote: »

Similar to how I worded my first post, but a bit more clear and in their language?

Did you do this by hand-written responses? It means I'll have to do it because he can't and I hate writing things by hand haha.

ASsI've posted several times, this is the sort of thing we said in my Mum's appeal for AA:

Pollycat wrote: »

We also adressed each point separately, starting by saying this:
"All the evidence of Mum’s core needs was explained in the claim form."


Where we had provided details of her core needs in the original application, I stated this and said something like:

• "eat and drink

As explained at Q30, Mum has difficulty in using kettles,saucepans and tin opener as well as opening packets. Therefore she is unable toget herself a reasonable meal ready. We were particularly worried about hergetting hot food during cold weather. To ensure Mum eats good, nutritional foodmy sister visits three times a day.

• manage treatment and medication.

At Q31 the claim form clearly stated that Mum sometimes forgetsto take her medication.

A lot of the drugs she takes are life critical and she takesthem at varying times of day: morning, lunchtime, after dinner, before bed."

Our appeal covered 5 pages of A4 and concluded with
"For the reasons above, we disagree with the decision notice.

We request that the decision be reconsidered as evidence ofrequiring assistance with care needs and personal care at least several timeseach day has been provided."

The 5 pages of A4 were typed.

zudecke

Thanks Pollycat! I'll upload a draft before he sends it.

BTW, this is the form we received in the post - I', guessing this is the standard appeal?





Looks so small! I know I can use other sheets of papers, just wasn't expecting this format

Pollycat

It's over a year ago but I think it seems a similar form.

I would have typed the reasons for the appeal, and got Mum to sign it, and then referred to that on the form e.g. where it says 'Reasons' put "See separate 5 pages enclosed".

We thought it was a good ideas - and CAB agreed - to point to where we'd said in the original application that Mum couldn't do something but they'd just ignored it.
e.g. refer to what you originally said in Qxx (see my post about Q30 & Q31).

It did help that we'd done the application online and still had a copy so we knew exactly what we'd put down.

SandraScarlett

zudecke wrote: »

Thanks so much .

Similar to how I worded my first post, but a bit more clear and in their language?

Did you do this by hand-written responses? It means I'll have to do it because he can't and I hate writing things by hand haha.

On another note, I'm not really too sure why they agreed to send the appeal letter out, but also offered him the opportunity for a decision maker to phone him "within 48 hrs".. The phone call sounds a bit like a red-herring and I don't want him to get a call and he mistakenly say's the wrong thing and jeopardises the claim/appeal.. I just don't see what the point of a call is?

They actually didn't call within 48 hours anyway, but still..

My friend didn't get an appeal form. I typed everything for her, and frequently referred to the original claim form, the first ATOS report, and the DM's letter, pointing out anomalies.

Marion wasn't as fortunate as Pollycat's appeal for her Mum, as the decision was still upheld, but eventually, the anomalies were agreed, and she had a second ATOS visit.

After this, her HRC DLA was reinstated, the LRM was increased to HRM, and everything was backdated.

xx

morette

Hi, We need to build the numbers of signatures for this e-petition.
Please read, sign, following the confirmation email, then share, Tweet and email to as many groups as you can.
epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/48164

Thank you.

zudecke

Hey guys - another thing - if I am indeed writing the appeal for him, should I state that explicitly? Does this work for or against his case?