Refusal by British authorities to sign form for pension

citizenessex

I am a pensioner and get (or have until now) a small French pension from the time we lived in France during the 1960s when it was obligatory to pay into an agency fund.

Up to a few years ago, I could verify myself on the form whether I was still living. Another French form I have to fill in yearly does ask for any authority to verify and in the past the police have stamped that form and once the bank as well.

This year the form which is now causing the problem has changed from self certification to asking a state/local government authority to verify it.

Obviously according to the French authority mindset you go to the local mairie or police station where you are registered. People do not normally go to GPs for verification as they do here.

There is only a council office here apparently for information and they will not sign and stamp it. The main building is some miles away.

The police also now refuse to sign and stamp it and said I should go to the GP. I phoned up the French authority and the person there said I should then go to the GP.

The NHS GP surgery claimed at first that the GP wouldn't sign because he couldn't understand French. When it was explained that it was only to verify that I was alive, the surgery said that they couldn't verify I was alive because I haven't been to see the GP for seven years.

So I offered to make an appointment and anyway the first person who would be informed in the event of a death if the patient was not under the care of the GP at the time was the GP holding the patients' medical records and the local primary trust also monitors the patients on the GP's list. At which point the surgery bangs down the phone.

I then rang up West Essex Primary Care Trust. They rang me back, perhaps after having contacted the surgery. The woman on the line started lecturing that the GP and the West Essex Primary Care Trust didn't have to sign the form going on and on ...

When I finally interrupted her repetition to ask where I should go, she continued with the lecture and suddenly changed to the fact that I haven't been to see the GP for seven years also. She also looked me up on the computer and found my name so I am obviously registered with them and am alive!

When I asked, she could not tell me which regulation stopped them from signing that I was still alive (especially as it is the health authorities who are a party to when someone dies and the trusts in charge of GPs monitor who is alive and dead on the GP lists!). She also wouldn't tell me where I should go but insisted on keeping lecturing me that they couldn't do it ... and then when I pointed out about the death certificates ... bang again down goes the telephone.

I need the form to be signed without trouble and expense to me.

I don't need prolonged lectures from people using NHS phones as to why an authority which has me on their computer apparently won't sign a form verifying I am still alive.

I receive circulars from the trust so they obviously know I am still alive. I have said to all that if they don't want to sign the form, they can write a "To Whom It May Concern" letter verifying I am still alive.

I am not running miles and spending my time and pension on getting a piece of paper signed that I am still alive.

It has crossed my mind that the French agency should be liaising with the British department of work and pensions and then this wouldn't come about in the first place but that doesn't help my immediate practical problem where people in authority do not produce the regulations, do not say where the form should be signed and just appear to want to babble and lecture and waste people's time.

Has anyone got experience of this and can tell me where locally I can get this form signed or the French pension will be stopped?

missile

If this was not a serious problem it would be funny. I suggest you make an appointment with your GP and tell him/her that the stress is making you ill and you will most likely find she will sign your form there and then.

EdInvestor

missile wrote: »

If this was not a serious problem it would be funny. I suggest you make an appointment with your GP and tell him/her that the stress is making you ill and you will most likely find she will sign your form there and then.

:T Good thinking Missile :

missile

Let's hope my idea works out for the OP

citizenessex

Hi everyone,

It gets much worse.

When I dropped off the form at the GP's surgery, they told me it would take 7-10 days for the GP to sign it. I told them that I would pick it up again.

I phoned up yesterday after 7 days when they told me the GP wouldn't sign it because he couldn't understand it, I hadn't been to the surgery for 7 years and they couldn't verify I was alive even though I am still on the patient register and still get circulars from the local health authority and the GP has not signed a death certificate and has not been contacted by anyone saying I am dead and the West Essex Primary Care Trust still have me on its computer etc etc.

Anyway, today when I phoned the GP surgery to say that I would be picking up the unsigned form, the staff at the GP surgery told they sent off on 13th July this important pension document second class two days after I had entrusted it with them without even a certificate of posting and without asking me first and the surgery staff tell me now, a 76 year old, that I should run to the sorting office.

carolinela

I would change gp's

citizenessex

My immediate practical problem, Caroline, is about not only making sure the French pension isn't stopped but is also now compounded by West Essex Primary Care Trust and its contractor GP who have sent off an important document which I told them I would be picking up using second class post and without a certificate of posting. Whether or not, West Essex Primary Care Trust have me on another contractor GP's register is therefore here nor there for me at the moment, Caroline. It is having the document and getting the document signed.

PS I wrote "signed form" instead of "unsigned form" which may account for your answer though. Thanx for answering!

missile

Maybe if you had made an appointment and taken the form in with a translation into English ........ but I guess you don't want to hear that? ¿Usted firmaría un formulario que usted no podría entender?

p00pieb0tt0m

There was a postal strike on the 13th so hopefully you will receive your form back soon!!

Did any instructions for completion come in English?

I previously have verified Spanish forms for this purpose. They have instructions in English in tiny print below the Spanish.

I work at a Main Post office but perhaps if you are friendly with a sub- postmaster/mistress they would do it. For the Spanish one, I had to see I.D. i.e. Passport so I could confirm the lady was who she said she was.

I always find that asking for things that are out of the ordinary should be done when a place is quiet! Its like the staff only have a certain amount of friendliness/politeness for any day, so if there are fewer customers you get a bigger share!!

I'm afraid I wouldn't stamp anything which doesn't have official English instructions.

EdInvestor

citizenessex wrote: »

My immediate practical problem, Caroline, is about not only making sure the French pension isn't stopped

Ring them up and tell them you are being stymied by the British bureaucracy.This should at least make them laugh. No doubt they would also give you more time to sort out le probleme anglais and keep paying the pension in the meantime.

You could enclose your latest bank statement, with your name and address on it, showing the pension being paid in. Your solicitor would probably also sign a certified copy of your passport for a small fee....

citizenessex

The form definitely wants a state authority. Not a company or solicitor (notaire) or the Post Office or bank. It's only to verify that I am still alive. I speak French so I have no difficulty with the form and it's quite a simple one anyway.

It's the GP surgery which is a partnership of several GPs with a number of staff and practice manager who say they don't understand simple French.

Anyway, it's difficult to tell why the GP won't sign the form. Since that was only one reason given and both the surgery staff and West Essex Primary Care Trust have said to me, with accusing tones, that I "haven't visited the GP in 7 years". I would have thought they would be pleased but no.

And as I have said, their attempts to persuade me that they might think I am dead (the form is only to verify I am still alive) have come to naught, as the GP surgery and West Essex Primary Care Trust have admitted to me that I am still on the computer and, as I pointed out, any death certificate would have to go through the GP or the Primary Care Trust would have been informed.

One of the problems highlighted in the Shipman Enquiry, if I remember rightly, was that the local Trust or health authority was supposed to monitor GP lists and should have picked up on the sheer number of sudden deaths. But here they are all complaining I could be dead when they haven't received anything to say such a thing and I still receive circulars from them.

Anyway, someone has reminded me there was a postal strike on July 13th. Obviously the right day to send something off by second class post. Especially as I was told when I dropped it off that it would take 7-10 days before the GP would sign anything and I told them distinctly I would pick up the document when it was signed.

But two days later, they fail to tell me the GP won't sign it and send an important pension document through second class post on a strike day without telling me and without a certificate of posting. It was only when I rang up seven days after I dropped it off that they told me the GP wouldn't sign it. And only the day after that when I phoned up to say I would be picking it up that they told me they had put it in the post two days after I had left it at the surgery.

Such a pity that patients are not asked to sign for so-called self employed GPs' NHS pensions before the GPs receive their occupational pensions. Perhaps that would concentrate their minds wonderfully, especially if that important document were also entrusted to second class post on the day that the postal workers go on strike ....

The problem has now been compounded in that I only have a photocopy of the form and still no signature/stamp from a state authority. I now have to spend my pension money on phoning France to get another form.

Unfortunately, they also have call centres in France and the call centre workers can only stay on the line with you a certain allocated period of time! So a leisurely chat and a laugh over a virtual glass of wine isn't an option, more's the dommage ...