New PIP statistics published.

rogerblack

Today, PIP statistics were published.

Following on from my earlier post on the first release of statistics in december.

In all cases below talking about new applications for PIP (not migrations from DLA,) from the non terminally ill.

In December, for all new claims made since April 2013, less than one in six had been processed.
A total of 34 of 220 thousand claims

From December till now, another 115 thousand claims have been made, and 34 thousand decisions made.

The number of decisions has started to increase, doubling since December.
But, it's still under a third of the rate of new claims - the backlog of claims is growing.
The total fraction of claims processed has risen from a sixth to a fifth.

At 28th Feb, 50% of claims have lead to an award.
8.8K were awarded enhanced mobility, 9.3K standard.
12.6K got enhanced daily living, and 9.8K standard daily living.

This is a total amount (per week) of:
8800*55 +9300*21 + 12600 * 79 + 9800 * 53 =2194100, for 68800 people.
Or a figure of 32 pounds a week.

This is including failed claims, so the average payout for successful claims is 64 pounds a week.
In 2010, new claims were being awarded for DLA at about the same award as high-rate care, about 82 pounds a week.

This comes out to PIP costing 78% of the DLA award - bang on target of 80%. (to within margins of accuracy).

By delaying PIP decisions, the government is borrowing from the least able to cope.
Of the 270000 people with an application in progress, the waiting time is on average 6 months.

At 32 pounds a week average, that's 220 million pounds.
From a group who is on average much less well off than the rest of the population.

DLA migrations also do not appear in these numbers, nor do the terminally ill.
There is no indication in the published figures that the hard cases were dealt with first - indeed the opposite seems true, with the cumulative total of awarded claims recently rising.

Cyclamen

the waiting time is on average 6 months.

Oh heck... My husband is only at 3 months mark.

We think he is low care and mobility on PIP. Not fussed about the money (although it would be very helpful) but a PIP award permits him to do fewer hours at work (16 hours for WTC) and I am hoping this will slow him down as the work is taking a huge toll on his health.

rogerblack

Cyclamen wrote: »

Oh heck... My husband is only at 3 months mark.

We think he is low care and mobility on PIP. Not fussed about the money (although it would be very helpful) but a PIP award permits him to do fewer hours at work (16 hours for WTC) and I am hoping this will slow him down as the work is taking a huge toll on his health.

This is an assumption - many people are waiting closer to 12.
It is very unclear as to how the PIP claim delay will change in the future.
They need to speed up the claims handling process by a factor of three - just to stand still with new applications.


Looking more closely at the numbers.

Month         Total                 Total                   Queue      New        New          Claims       Time
                   claims               decided                               claims     claims        decided     to
                                                                                                       monthly     monthly     clear(mo)

Apr              3                       0                          3              3               1                  0              
Jun              31                     0                          31            28            14                 0
Aug             96                     3                          93            65            32                 1              93
Oct              165                   11                        154          69            34                 4              38
Dec             220                   33                        187          55            27                 11            17
Feb             297                   56                        241          77            38                 12            20
Mar             335                   69                        266          38             38                 14           19

The last column is the relevant one.
If they carry on clearing cases at the same rate as they are now, in the order received, they will take 19 months to process the whole lot. Half the cases will be done in 9 months.

During that time though, around 700K new cases will have come through.

If they triple the existing rate of clearance - then they finish the queue in 6 months, and everyone needs to wait 6 months on a new application.
If they get 5 times faster, they finish the queue in 4 months, and can then start migrating over the DLA caseload, completing this in only 8 years.

Twirlygirl

Interesting and mind blowing reading, thanks rogerblack.

So essentially the government must be very happy with how it's going as they are on target and Atos/Capita are taking so much of the blame?

Morglin

The new guide, issued by the DWP, on 27th May, to ATOS and Capita, makes it clear that they want more 'paper assessments' (as under the old DLA system), and less face to face medicals, to try and clear the backlog....:wall:


https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/315970/pip-assessment-guide-mw-020614.pdf

Interesting to see though, that the awards actually made, are higher than under the old system:


http://www.benefitsandwork.co.uk/news/2786-three-quarters-of-pip-claims-still-undecided
Lin

Richie-from-the-Boro

"""nor do the terminally ill"""

Between 8th April 2013 and 28th March 2014, the claims and decisions made were :

- 349,000 new claims were registered for PIP, 13,900 were for claims made under Special Rules for Terminally Ill people
- 83,900 decisions had been made on PIP new claims, 15,100 were for claims made under Special Rules for Terminally Ill people
- the DWP completed only 68,800 decisions on non terminally ill cases out of 349,000 claims - around 19.5%.
- of the 68,800 non - terminally ill claims which have resulted in a decision being made, only 50% [34,400] have resulted in an award
- it means around only 9.8% of all claims are resulting in an award being decided and then paid in favour of the claimant
- the 50% falls to 45% when withdrawn claims are included.

The DWP sneakily uses a figure of 59% qualifying towards the start of the release, it's misleading because it adds the percentages of both terminally ill and non terminally ill cases together to give a higher figure, they also base the figure on withdrawn claims not being included.

The figures get even worse when you look in to how 36,800 claims in payment were made up:

On the 28th February 2014, 36.8 thousand people had PIP in payment. Of these:

- 29% were assessed under Special Rules for Terminally Ill people.
- 31% were assessed as having a malignant disease as their main disability, and 21% as mental illness
- 22% received Daily Living Award only, 10% received Mobility Award only, and 68% received both Daily Living and Mobility Award.
- 72% received an award at the enhanced rate, and 28% at the standard rate.

However, for normal rules new claims only, 60% received an award at the enhanced rate and 100% for terminally ill people. There's no information on waiting times, appeals and reconsiderations.

NickD

"""want more 'paper assessments"""

DWP issues latest guidance for PIP assessment


DWP' newly issued guidance [27th May 2014] for the assessment of Personal Independence Payment claimants.

The guidance clarifies (medical evidence)

2.3.3. Claimants will be encouraged to submit alongside their claimant questionnaire any additional evidence they may have that they think is pertinent to their claim. This is not a requirement and some case files may therefore contain no additional information other than the claimant questionnaire (and in some cases will not even have that).

2.3.4. Claimants will receive guidance on documents that may be particularly useful. They will only be encouraged to provide evidence that they already have and not to delay their claim to seek evidence or ask for evidence for which they might be charged – such as a letter from their GP.

2.3.5. HPs should consider all claims at initial review and, if they believe that further evidence would help inform their advice to DWP or negate the need for a face-to-face consultation; providers should take steps to obtain this. The consideration of whether further evidence should be sought should take place before any decision to schedule a face-to-face consultation is taken.

2.3.6. In the claimant questionnaire, claimants are encouraged to list the professionals who support them and are best placed to advise on their circumstances. HPs should consider which professionals identified can provide useful evidence. They should not simply request evidence from all professionals identified as standard.

Safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time requirement

2.8.7. Before selecting a descriptor, the HP must consider whether the claimant can reliably complete the activity in the manner described in the descriptor, taking into account where they can do so:

• Safely.
• To an acceptable standard.
• Repeatedly.
• In a reasonable time period.

Decision - maker's guidance:

No amendments have been reported on the government website pertaining to any changes in the guidance issued to [staff guide] decision - makers.

Regulations

The latest version of the The Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013 appears here Any outstanding amendments are subject to the following annotation:

Changes to legislation - There are outstanding changes not yet made by the legislation.gov.uk editorial team to The Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013. Those changes will be listed when you open the content using the Table of Contents below. Any changes that have already been made by the team appear in the content and are referenced with annotations.

nickD

Simon7685

All this does make some very interesting reading and some mind blowing number crunching............

Basically the DWP have made a hash of it and it seems are now in a big hole that is getting bigger by the day. Why they did not just tighten up DLA in the first place still amazes me, especially after the ESA fiasco, obviously they and the government can not see the warning signs.

On a positive note for those of us that have indefinite DLA awards, hopefully it might mean we get left in peace for a while longer than anticipated????

I am still in shock from my indefinite award last week:eek: and done in 24 hours from receiving the renewal form, including an increase in care! They signed for it last Wednesday, reawarded on Thursday and the letter arrived Saturday.

Then on Monday I got the "thank you for returning your form" letter, sheer brilliance:rotfl:

rogerblack

Simon7685 wrote: »

Why they did not just tighten up DLA in the first place still amazes me,

Because the spin that DLA was out of control, and the implication it was people 'swinging the lead' was a flat-out-lie used to justify replacing DLA.

DLA numbers were increasing because:
The DLA eligible population was aging. (Initially, there were no people >65 on DLA. As time goes on, those reaching 65 stay on DLA.)
The working age population age on average was rising. Old people are more likely to be entitled to DLA.
More people were 'in the community' - rather than in institutions.
More adults were not dying of previously untreatable illnesses.
More children were surviving infancy with serious conditions.

glynisrose

So that would be why my sister's home assessment was cancelled...

Indie_Kid

rogerblack wrote: »

Because the spin that DLA was out of control, and the implication it was people 'swinging the lead' was a flat-out-lie used to justify replacing DLA.

So, why is it only people 16-65 being assessed? Ok, I know we're the biggest claim group because of the age. But I doubt that there are only people in this age group swinging the lead.

Richie-from-the-Boro

- as of @ the 28 th February 2014
- 53% of claims in payment are made to females
- 6% of claims of claims in payment were made to people under 25
- 21% were made to people aged 60 and over



- malignant disease group 31% of the caseload
- distribution has been heavily affected by the high proportion of assessments under Special Rules for Terminally Ill people in the Malignant Disease group (88



- claims in payment, 23.2 thousand were assessed at the enhanced rate
- claims in payment, 9.8 thousand were assessed at the standard rate
- claims in payment, and 3.7 thousand were assessed at the nil rate
- claims in payment, of the 23.2 thousand PIP claims in payment assessed at the enhanced Daily Living Award rate, 10.6 thousand were assessed under Special Rules for Terminally Ill people.