What can money/savings be spent on for ESA purposes?

gray1404

It is a disabled family member of mine - for whom I have supported - who has received the backpayment of benefit (see opening post) NOT myself.

gray1404

Could I please get some clarification on how this might be an official error. Basically my family member had been paying council tax themselves for years. Recently we discovered that he was entitled to an exemption on the basis of Severe Mental Disorder and this was accepted (and backdated most of the period applied for).

Would the council say that because we only just applied for it then it was no an official error because we didn't apply sooner?

It would be really helpful if we could get this regarded as an official error and thus the amount disregarded for ESA capital purposes. How would one go about getting this regarded as an official error?

The only other thing I would say is that he has been in receipt of Housing Benefit a couple of years now. They are aware he receives ESA Support Group and the higher rate of PIP too. As part of the Housing Benefit claim they rejected the backdating request. In response to that the Community Mental Health Team sent a letter to them confirming his conditions and went into detail on how this effects his life and ability to manage. They asked that they council looked at the decision not to backdate again. They saw sense and overturned their decision.

Would that be enough to claim that they, at that point should have stopped charging him Council Tax and applied the exemption?

This is a key issue here because they have only backdated to 1 April 2011. We actually requested 12 months further as this was the date he started paying Council Tax. They have refused this for the following reason: -
The Council will only backdate a discount 6 years. The reason for this is because Council Tax bills were originally accompanied by information booklets containing details relating to reductions and now the information is readily available on the council's website.

They made the above decision on 11 October 2017. We do not know if we could appeal again this to the tribunal or not. I think there is a strong case. However it might put him in a worse situation for ESA purposes if he ends up with more capital to have to deal with.

I know you only have two months to take a council tax decision to the tribunal so will have to decide over the weekend if we want to do this. I believe it can be done online.

I am actually really finding it hard to come up with valid reasons for the appeal to be honest. I also wonder if it is worth writing back to the council at the same time saying we have appealed to the tribunal and asking that they also look at their decision again in case they are willing to overturn it. I guess I would need some compelling reasons as to why though.

epitome

The closest I can get to council tax rebate being disregarded at all is this

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2008/794/schedule/9/made

No.11
ignore a) it does not come under that
b) any income related benefit

it does not say council tax reduction. so i would first get it confirmed that it is included to be disregarded for a year. then move on to official error

which you can see is covered by

an official error as defined in regulation 1(3) of the Social Security and Child Support (Decisions and Appeals) Regulations 1999; and

which i dont have time to look at

Mersey_2

gray1404 wrote: »

Could I please get some clarification on how this might be an official error.

Would the council say that because we only just applied for it then it was no an official error because we didn't apply sooner?

It would be really helpful if we could get this regarded as an official error and thus the amount disregarded for ESA capital purposes. How would one go about getting this regarded as an official error?

The only other thing I would say is that he has been in receipt of Housing Benefit a couple of years now. They are aware he receives ESA Support Group and the higher rate of PIP too. As part of the Housing Benefit claim they rejected the backdating request. In response to that the Community Mental Health Team sent a letter to them confirming his conditions and went into detail on how this effects his life and ability to manage. They asked that they council looked at the decision not to backdate again. They saw sense and overturned their decision.

Would that be enough to claim that they, at that point should have stopped charging him Council Tax and applied the exemption?

I think the reason that I'd certainly regard it as the Council's error - and the point Martin made on the MLMS - was that there is no need to 'apply' for the smi rebate. The problem is that some Councils are both failing to list the rebate at all on their sites or, even when the LA has arranged carers and so on, they still haven't actioned the smi rebate.


[But I can see why Councils don't readily admit that it's 'official error' as this would be maladministration and so they'd potentially have to also compensate residents on top]


I don't see a need to appeal the decision - unless you believe their £5k calculation is wrong.


Unless you want to pursue the 7th year - for that I think CIS linked to the Tribunal decision which allows backdating to go back further than the usual 6 years (the norm for civil claims).