Hello MSers, some news from Benefits and Work on PIP home assessment:
"We’ve now published the results of our survey into PIP and ESA home assessments. Many thanks to the almost 1,900 people who took part.
Your MP probably won’t like what we discovered, though.
Amongst our findings:
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83% of the people who completed the PIP survey had been allowed a home assessment, whilst the figure for ESA was only 41%.
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3% of PIP claimants had a decision on the paper evidence alone, without needing a face-to-face assessment, but this leapt to 28% for ESA.
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38% of PIP claimants who had a home assessment hadn’t even asked for one, whilst for ESA it was just 7%.
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51% of ESA home assessments were carried out by doctors, for PIP the figure was just 4%.
And, as in assessment centre medicals, many home assessments still involve a health professional staring at a computer screen and reading off questions, with no hint of empathy for the person sitting opposite them.
Or, in one bizarre case, for the person sitting in the next room:
“The assessor sat in a different room to me as he needed a table for his laptop. He complained about the software for home visits throughout and never broke from typing to even look up when I spoke.”
But what your MP really won’t like is the fact that, over and over again, people told us that when they were unreasonably refused a home assessment, contacting their MP about it had a dramatic effect.
We didn’t hear from a single person who had been refused a home assessment once their MP was involved, whether it was for PIP or ESA.
So, with apologies to all the people we know already work really hard in MP’s constituency offices, if you are refused a home medical and you have solid grounds for requesting one – we strongly recommend you contact your MP."
Best Regards
Fay