Esa hell ..desperate for feedback and advice anyone please :-)

fumin37

Thankyou so much pipkin .I need it

epitome

fumin37 wrote: »

The problem and issue was around june,and the fact that the tribunal refused to take on my additional evidence.
He told me that this was almost certainly an error of law.

Unfortunately he is almost certainly wrong. A tribunal will look at your medical condition as it was before and as it was at the time of the decision. The tribunal cannot consider any evidence of worsening that has occured after the decision date.

He has has told me i need to appeal again against the decision in June and gather more evidence to back up how my conditions are affecting me .

You can only do so if you find an error in law, which you have not found yet, and would have to argue "at the date of decision" how you would have been entitled to ESA.

fumin37 wrote: »

He also said that even though i didt make a paper claim the fact i rang up and stated my conditions had worsened straight after the tribunal counted as a new claim verbaly .

What he is saying here, is impossible.

I think i need to see a solicitor to be honest pipkin.

What you need to do is phone tribunal and ask for a Written Statement of Reasons for the June 2017 hearing. Then, I agree ask to see a solicitor, through the CAB perhaps. If it is too late to appeal to the Upper Tribunal, or they won't allow you to do it, as you have no error in law. There is still the option of Judicial Review, your solicitor can advise you on that....but any review will only take account of your medical condition as it was before the decision date.

Good Luck.....

Penitent wrote: »

Aren't all calls to/from the DWP (potentially) recorded by the DWP? Can a DWP employee say they were being recorded without their consent if they've already consented for their employer to record them?

The DWP has no policy on claimants recording calls. AIUI, The law does not require either party in a phone conversation to say they are recording a call, unless they intend to publish or potentially use the call recording in evidence.

That said, if you inform the DWP person that you are recording the call, they have to right to refuse consent and end the call.

Anyone who calls the DWP can request the audio copy call recording, so in theory there is no need for a claimant to record the call. All inbound calls to the network lines are recorded by DWP. However, as I have said many times here, not all DWP staff log the calls in the way they are supposed to..making finding the call later very difficult...but not impossible...To find such a "lost" call, you, the caller, should keep a diary of every call you make to the DWP.

• The phone number you are calling from
• The date
• The time you dialled
• The exact time the call is answered by the staff member
• The staff members first name
• The office location, the name of the town, i.e. Grimsby, Bootle etc
• The content of the call, what was discussed

They say this in their call greeting. If you miss it, ask them again, and make sure they say a name of a town and not something generic like "Central office" "Courts Building"

Very rarely you may be given a direct dial number to call a specific department these inbound calls will not be recorded by DWP.

DWP outbound calls are generally not recorded, some of them are supposed to be like Decision Maker calls, but even these are rarely recorded.

fumin37

Thankyou again epitome .
You can see ,from everything i have posted from the begining here just how much i have been getting messed around and how it looks as though it is "me" mixing things up .
This has caused unbelievable distress.
Unfortunately i am not entitled to legal aid .So will only be able to get advice.
I agree that the verbal over the phone suposed claim is bizzare ..basically i didnt make one simple as that.
And im sorry but i do feel that someone has cocked up along the way ,have been changing their rules at every single call, and i have been on the recieving end of all these mixed messsges.
Thankyou also for the clarification about phone calls too.Thats good to know.

DavidF

Is there not any chance you could appeal and get into the support group ? Are your conditions treatable or likely to improve ?
Not wanting to rejig the past but if you and your daughter suffer from the same condition then she should be able to use your "experience" to prepare herself for the "battle".
My misses has a fairly rare condition that not many know about.....at the end of the day it's all about having evidence of the condition and evidence backed up by a "professional" that states how your condition limits you......Believe me I know that is far too easy to write and much much harder in the real world.
Occupational therapists, Support workers, Carers, Physio's, Consultants, nurses and finally GP's are all good to reasonable sources of evidence. Trust me I know it's not much fun explaining a condition that effects less than 1% of the population.

epitome

If Fumin is to get into the Support Group
She will need a error in law on the latest Tribunal hearing to take it to Upper Tribunal....the first step is to ask Tribunal for a Written Statement of Reasons for both hearings.

Or to get evidence of another worsening condition now, send it to ESA with a request to be re-assessed for Support Group, she will have another medical Asessment and if necessary, appeal the decision. The decision could be No LCW and the claim could be closed, but on this one, she would then be allowed to be paid on appeal. And the new Tribunal could say she has No LCW and close her ESA, losing her appeal.

Alice_Holt

fumin37 wrote: »

I dont know ,I give up pipkin !
far too much conflicting advice.
One would think that the people at ESA would be the people who know ?
He seemed very clear about the decision not to take additional evidence as being completely wrong.
I was also told this exact same thing at the time by a different dwp worker.
who knows its is too confusing.

This advice was completely wrong.

The tribunal is reviewing the DWP decision on the date that the DWP made that decision not to award you ESA (which will be some months before the decision date).
They can only consider your condition and abilities re ESA activities at that date - because you have asked them to adjudicate on whether that decision was correct or incorrect. They cannot, in effect, use the appeal conduct a new WCA.
Does this make sense to you?

From your OP it seems you are now out of time to ask the UT to review the FTT decision (which has to be on an error of law).

If you consult a solicitor you will be wasting your money.

The best advice you have been given is by pmlindyloo at post 43.
Apply for PIP, and make sure your daughter claims the benefits she is entitled to.

fumin37

Thankyou for your kind reply David F.
My daughter and i share a chronic life long condition which isnt realisticaly treatable and will never get better .
On top of that i have one degenerative condition which cant be treated yet.
I have 4 other conditions which are a bit more complex.Unfortunately i look perfectly fine most of the time.
DWP have had LOTS and lots of evidence from doctors ,specialists etc and they aknowledge there is no doubt my conditions exist.
One massive problem with gathering evidence i have found however is the distinct lack of support ie ..waiting months on end to see specialists.Being bounced back and forth from one service back to another or back to the gp ,being unable to get drs appointments ,not being able to get hold of support workers etc etc.all this needs to be done in time for assesements,medicals ,tribunals etc etc ..
Apparantly its down to me being able to PROVE how these affect me.Yet at every turn it is made so difficult to do this when the support simply isnt there when you need it.
I am sure by what you are saying in your post you and your partner can probably relate to this.
As for appealing ,whats the point? They have me by the balls .I am already very concerned about the state of my health and how much more i can reasonably be expected to deal with .
I also feel really concerned abput my daughter being caught up in this awful system so im not sure where i will go to next with all of this at the moment.

fumin37

Hi Alice Holt.
Thankyou,
firstly i have no money to waste on a solicitor as i have no money .
The man at the DWP said i should be able to get an hours free advice thats all.
He said that i need to apply for my statement of reasons and that the majority of the time as long as i can explain the length of time its taken me to ask for this an appeal would be accepted.
I have applied for PIP some time ago.

epitome

Alice_Holt wrote: »

From your OP it seems you are now out of time to ask the UT to review the FTT decision (which has to be on an error of law).

It wouldn't hurt to ask if they can be submitted late, just as DWP Man Recons and appeals can be submitted late.

If you consult a solicitor you will be wasting your money.

Maybe not, doesn't the CAB have solicitors for client referral?

If Fumin gets the Written Statement of reasons from the June 2017 Tribunal, gets evidence of why she thinks that the DWP decision not to allow ESA (in January 2017 ? ) was wrong....without making any reference to any conditions that got worse after the decision date. Or why the later tribunal should have said Support Group on the "worsened evidence".

Even if it is too late for UTT, there is always Judicial Review as an option. Fumin can take her evidence to a free solicitor specialising in benefits to see if there is a case to answer. Probability will be there is no chance, but if Fumin does her homework well enough before going to the solicitor there might be a chance. The problem I think will come if Fumin loses, could be a hefty legal bill coming her way, but take advice on law forums and see what the situation would be....(given that you have no money and are on benefits)

She could even be a litigant in person.

Fumin,
I am only thinking out loud. In reality you will most likely just end up accepting these decisions.

Remember there is permitted work on ESA, work less than 16 hours a week, earn no more than £120 a week and your earnings will not affect your ESA award..... Of all the things in the benefit world that permitted work allowance is really cool.

NeilCr

Whether the CAB has solicitors for client referral depends on the local office

We only have one. They deal with family law and you get a short free meeting with them.

Other bigger CABs may have more