motability

atrixblue.-MFR-.

Nilrem wrote: »

My personal opinion, having had to make use of the motobility scheme in the past is thus.

If you've got a current car that is in good working order keep it.
Put the mobility money (or everything bar the cost of running the car) to one side.

If your current car is only two years old there is a very good chance that by the time it becomes uneconomical to run you could have the better part of 5-10 years of mobility saved up to outright buy another car.

Motorbility tends to be good under three conditions imo.
1: You have the award and need a new car now, but can't afford to buy another way.
2: You need a specific car for your disability/needs and can't afford it another way.
3: You want a new car every 3 years.

Remember you are giving your full mobility component to Motorbility and won't have anything at the end of the lease, and it will still cost you fuel to run the car.
You also unfortunately with motobility have zero real gurantee of having the car even under lease for the full term - I know several people who due to DLA/DWP screw ups have lost their motorbility cars when the incompetents at the DWP reviewed their cases and couldn't read their own doctors notes (in one case a person with a life time disability had her car taken away at about 6 weeks notice and was left without one for 18 months whilst it went to a tribunal who awarded the money back with a profuse apology for the mess as soon as she got through the door, but that didn't help with the fact that for 18 months she was stuck without a car and paying for expensive taxis).

My parents after a similar mess bought a new Kia about 12 years ago, kept it running until they gave it to my Sister about 2 years ago and even after buying (for cash) another, much better Kia worked out on top compared to having used motorbility.
I think it worked out that even after paying for all the insurances/maintenance work plus the cost of the cars themselves they'd saved about 5K+, not including the fact that they now have 3 more years of nothing other than insurance/fuel on the new car, so another 10k+ over that time and it looks like it'll keep piling up.
They actually did some quite detailed sums before buying the first car and worked out they only had to keep it running for 3-4 years for it to work out cheaper than the Motorbility Scheme (so years 5-8 paid for the next one), and with the modern warranties on a lot of cars it's getting easier to keep them running reasonably cheaply.

Of course this math only really works if you're happy with cars that cost <£20k new, and are happy running a 3-5 year old car (and have either the money up front to buy starter car, or a working car already to run whilst you save the cash).

It's worth remembering that some manufacturers finance schemes can/do take longer DLA/PIP mobility awards as suitable income for finance.

saving 5-10 years of mobility component can could lead to issues with other benefits as it would be classed as saving.
DWP check bank/PO accounts also so would find out if not declared.
You could also be questioned to the fact that why you haven't used the money at all in that period and the DWP could argue the fact mobility isn't needed for you as you haven't spent any of during the award periods.


some mobility vehicles you can get without total payment of the mobility component of DLA/PIP.


When my neighbor had his DLA stopped and he appealed, he kept mobility in the loop and provided evidence to them and the DWP, mobility agree'd with him that he could keep the mobility vehicle for the appeal period his tribunal came 6 months after it stopped and he was awarded the same rate as prior by a tribunal panel as he is never going to get better he will get worse its a degenerative condition.