Claiming

PiP is awarded to those with a medical need. You may want to complete the form yourself, however, this is considered unwise as it forms the basis of the claims. At Lestons, we strongly suggest that you should consider the potential costs of getting an application wrong, a demonstration of this is shown below.

 

Benefit	Current high rate	Multiplied by 1500 weeks (approx. 30 years)
Daily living	£59.70 per week	89,550
Mobility	£62.25 per week	93,375
Carer’s allowance	£67.25 per week	100,875
TOTAL		£283,800

 

This sum does not include benefits such as disabled railcards, reduction of costs for coming down a council tax band etc, in truth the cumulative award could easily exceed £300,000, hence our suggestion to get expert help rather than “muddle through” it.

 

Your personal caseworker can arrange specialist medical professionals who will fill in the form for you so that it meets the myriad of criteria used in the assessment process (they also know what “potholes” to avoid). We always aim to use medical professionals from a specific discipline that matches your problems. In practice we tend to find that the determination board shows the appropriate professional courtesy and does not question the opinion of our expert. An additional benefit is that because you have had an expert fill in the form, coupled with specialist medical evidence there really is no point in making you attend a medical assessment at all, as such having our help may well remove any medical assessment altogether. Should the award not meet expectations, then we would be delighted to represent you at an appeal to give you the best chance of success.

 

Filling in the form without assistance

If you are complete the form yourself, then be careful not to contradict yourself which will raise concerns. For example, you may state 2-3 days on the form and then say 3-4 days on another, very similar part of the form. Furthermore, you may state you are mentally unable to fill in the form but fill in it anyway (classic Catch 22 – see later paragraph). 

If you are going to attempt to fill in the form yourself then please bear in mind the following definitions: 

• Reliably, in a timely fashion, repeatedly and safely - You must be able to complete an activity, potentially using aids or appliances or with support from another person (or support dog). 
• Reliably - Done to a reasonable standard.
• In a timely fashion - Under twice the time it would take for an individual without any issues
• Repeatedly - Consideration needs to be given to the cumulative effects of symptoms such as pain and fatigue.
• Safely - Conducted in a fashion that is unlikely to cause harm
• Risk and Safety - can an activity be undertaken withour risk
• Aids - Devices that help the performance of a function, for example, walking sticks or spectacles.
• Appliances - Devices that provide or replace a missing function, for example, artificial limbs, stomas.
• Support from other people - The assessment will take into account where individuals need the support of another person or persons to carry out an activity – including where that person has to carry out the activity for them in its entirety. The criteria refer to three types of support:
• Assistance - This is the support that requires the presence and physical intervention of another person i.e., actually doing some or all of the task in question. This specifically excludes non-physical intervention such as prompting or supervision which are defined below. To apply, this only needs to be required for part of the activity.
• Prompting - Is support provided by reminding or encouraging an individual to undertake or complete a task but not physically helping them? To apply, this only needs to be required for part of the activity.
• Supervision - Is a need for the continuous presence of another person to avoid a serious adverse event from occurring to the individual. There must be evidence that any risk would be likely to occur in the absence of such supervision. To apply, this must be required for the full duration of the activity.
• Unaided - Within the assessment criteria, the ability to perform an activity ‘unaided’ means without either the use of aids or appliances or assistance/prompting/supervision from another person.

 

The form is not the easiest to fill in or understand, we would not go as far to say it includes “traps” but getting it wrong can deny you a benefit which can make a huge difference to managing your disability. The original form will form the basis of all determinations, getting it wrong could have dire consequences so getting it right the first time is crucial. If you are adamant that you have the appropriate skills to complete the form then we politely suggest that you make a photocopy of the form and fill that in first, then read through it carefully, look for the “traps”, when you are fully sure then fill in the original, and then take a copy of that as you can refer back to it when they question you at the medical assessment, again there would be a great risk of contradiction when questioned on elements of the form.

 

Filling in the form without assistance – a classic “Catch 22”

The classic “Catch 22” here is obvious – how can someone who has a mental illness have the mental capacity to fill in a complex claim form – just by filling in the form shows that you are mentally able to do it – hence the “Catch 22”, the way around this is to get the form filled in by someone else.

 

How we can help

We can arrange all the medical assessments and reports needed to complete the form for the DWP which will detail your situation. Please note that medical costs (disbursements) are outside our control and therefore may exceed our standard charge. Rest assured we would not incur any charges without your consent, please note we make no commission from these referrals but do need clients to open a case so that we can prepare a brief for them. We would always suggest you are seen at home so that our appointed assessor can include your local environment within their assessment (while there they can take notes which can be used as the basis to try and obtain grants for home adaptations, reports to councils to try and get your council tax band lowered and so on). To gain our assistance simply create a case by using the link at the top of this page and our staff will be delighted to assist.

 

To gain our assistance you need to open a case, this is done by simply clicking on the link at the top of the page, you will then need to deposit a sum equal to one hour’s usage, upon receipt of these funds you will be assigned your personal caseworker who will telephone you to discuss the matter and make suggestions on how to proceed. Please note your caseworker can only give generic advice, their role is to prepare your details for handling by our appointed medical assessor and to act as your point of contact.

 

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