PIP is in a mess. We all know it and only the DWP try to deny it.
But the surest signs that panic is beginning to set in is the fact that
Capita have now more than doubled the pay they are offering to assessors in their attempt to get on top of the backlog. Capita health professionals now have a ‘
new incentive scheme’ which means they can earn up to £900 a day. Not bad for physiotherapists more accustomed to earning £40 an hour.
In addition, the DWP have rewritten their guidance to assessors in the hope of persuading them to carry out fewer face-to-face medicals and assess more people just on paper evidence, backed up by a telephone call to the claimant to get additional information where necessary. Currently 98% of PIP assessments are face-to-face, but the DWP is aiming for this figure to drop to around 75%. This means a big increase in the number of PIP claimants who will be getting a call out of the blue from an Atos or Capita health professional.
We’ll be updating our guide to claiming PIP with more information about how decisions will be made about who gets a face-to-face medical and also with suggestions about how to deal with a phone call from a PIP health professional, by the end of the week.
In some cases the changes will mean claimants with substantial impairments getting an award of PIP without having to attend a medical, which can only be a good thing.
But in other cases the guidance makes it clear that assessors can refuse to make any award of PIP based simply on the claim pack completed by the claimant, with telephone clarification of specific issues if required.
It makes it even more vital that PIP ‘How your disability affects you’ forms are completed in as much detail as possible and that you get medical evidence if you can.
Unfortunately, Citizens Advice have discovered that half of all GP surgeries are now charging for evidence for ESA appeals and there’s no reason to suppose that things are any different when it comes to PIP.
