I’ve been off work for nearly a year now, obvs they are no longer paying me and I get contributory ESA. I asked for ill health retirement. They’ve just sent me their report that says my main problem is ‘tiredness’ and so I’m not eligible. I can’t cope with fighting this. What would happen if I resigned? Would I lose my ESA? Do I have to go back and make myself ill/have a relapse to prove it? Only been there five years so won’t get much from the retirement if I did get it.
Chronic fatigue is rather different from tiredness, so their report is questionable. Do you have a Union?
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Yes. Not been any help so far, but I’ll ring them again on Monday.
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Teal,
Please do not resign but pursue the option of early medical retirement. You have been diagnosed with MS and, as this is a chronic condition, you should be eligible for early retirement. Of course, I do not know who is your employer, how long you worked there, how long you have paid into the pension scheme, and your age. These are factors to take into account.
As Whammel says, your union should be able to help as they will have experience of this. You mention a report; was this carried out by your employer’s Occupational Health assessor? It seems odd to state that tiredness is your main issue; surely MS is your main issue and tiredness, or more correctly fatigue, is a symptom and a contributory factor. Did they make reasonable adjustments for you before you stopped working?
I have been through the early medical retirement process and I will help if at all possible. If your union is useless then there are other agencies you could contact such as the CAB.
Sorry about all the questions.
Best wishes
Alun
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Hello Teal.
Don’t resign, If you can manage it do the retirement through ill health. It might help to go to citizens’s advice to point you in the right direction. My union was crap with my case. I went through occupational health. There’s some good advice on this website as well.
Don’t despair.
Best wishes, Steve
if you resign you should bear in mind that your pension is based on your last salary.
take advice as said by whammel, alun, and steve.
Teal,
I can only echo the comments. I dont think you should resign and MS fatigue is significantly different from tired. A union rep , occupational health or HR should be suitably well informed. Your GP might also be able to help explain the impacts of your condition.
The company I worked for offered my the option to resign or apply for ill health early retirement, they explained the pros and cons and they recommended the IHER, which I took and 7 years down the line I am very happy to get a regular (if small) monthly income which provides help and security with the bills.
All the best
Mick
Hi Teal,
Yes; there’s no way you should resign; unfortunately some unions are rubbish; is it just your local rep.?
The Disabled Law Society (DLS) are paid by the MS Society for exactly this type of occurrence; http://dls.org.uk/ and will represent you to your employers or in court.
Then there is Home Page | Equality and Human Rights Commission
Then there is the Pension Advisory Service https://www.pensionsadvisoryservice.org.uk/content/publications-files/uploads/retiring_early_due_to_ill_health_Apr_2014.pdf which is a Government run free service about your pension. I do recommend you look at this now as there is an article/info about Early Retirement due to Ill Health right on the first page.
Even if you only get say £50 per month it’s for the rest of your life. They can also give you an estimate of when you 65 what your State Pension will be.
George
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Thank you everyone. Lots of useful stuff there.
I am not well enough to work anymore and was off work sick. The CAB man advised just keep getting the sick notes and then at some point, work will decide what to do. This was good advice. In the end the after months and months, they asked me in for an interview and asked if I would be capable of doing some work, I said ‘Only if you don’t mind me peeing myself and falling over occasionally’. I believe the CAB man said the employee if unwell with a long term condition, should not initiate any push for anything but after a time, the law means that the employer should take some sort of action whether that be interviews, fit for work informal discussion then protocol would inititiate some further discussion or action on their part. It is their role to ensure that they do what they can for ensuring the employee is well enough or not well enough to work, along with medical evidence and Dr letters that type of thing.
I had one informal discussion, then three interviews. They were all rubbish, appalling wrong letters were sent, I can’t tell you how rubbish they were and once my sick pay was held back. Anyway, it was all very traumatic but had to be done. I had been struggling for a long while and after going through a massive adjustment cycle and 6 weeks mindfullness counselling, I have settled in to my new life of not working. It is very hard at the time to not get very angry and upset by all the changes that M.S. has upon us. I think in retrospect, I would have had it a bit easier if I had just sort of settled into the idea that I was a bit beggered up and something had to change.
I agree with everyone else, do not resign. It changes everything and the paperwork after if you continue to be unwell will be awful. If you are deemed unfit to work by your employer at some point, the paperwork is still huge but there is a very specific DWP system in place that is like a path, it is a pain but it is doable. If anyone sends you any forms now, make sure you photocopy everything including all letters and sick notes and get very up to date with your filing. Always keep a second copy so that if you have to send anything off re DWP, pensions, employer etc. you have one ready. Keep a diary of your sick dates starting at the beginning and all correspondence since, it will come in handy.