ESA - on receiving a decision

Hello, hope everyone's doing OK. I got the dreaded ESA50 to transfer from IB to ESA in September and managed to complete the horrible form with your truly excellent guides. I would have been totally up the creek without them. With support, I managed to get out and took a draft of the form to a local branch of a national organization to see if their Welfare Rights Worker could help me 'tighten up' what I'd drafted but was fairly horrified by their suggestions - including to take out all the detail, stick to the boxes, not worry about supporting evidence 'until the appeal' and over-exaggerate and went away and ignored these suggestions. Needless to say I was however quite horrified. So if I have understood your latest newsletter correctly and you are indeed thinking of offering a service giving individual advice, I think that would be really useful.

Now I have had sometime to recover from completing the form, I am having to face up to the fact I will be hearing the outcome of my ESA application sometime from the DWP, and I need to be prepared. Please could you advise on what information I need to ask them for when I receive their decisions in order to deal with whatever the outcome is - unless they put me in the Support Group first time I will have to ask for the mandatory reconsideration and then appeal if that fails - can you tell me what forms and information I need to ask them for after I receive their decision in order to do this? Or, if I (fingers crossed) get a good decision, what I need to ask for to find out when it will be reviewed and anything else I should probably know?

Thank you.

canttrusthesystem wrote: Hello, hope everyone's doing OK. I got the dreaded ESA50 to transfer from IB to ESA in September and managed to complete the horrible form with your truly excellent guides. I would have been totally up the creek without them. With support, I managed to get out and took a draft of the form to a local branch of a national organization to see if their Welfare Rights Worker could help me 'tighten up' what I'd drafted but was fairly horrified by their suggestions - including to take out all the detail, stick to the boxes, not worry about supporting evidence 'until the appeal' and over-exaggerate and went away and ignored these suggestions. Needless to say I was however quite horrified. So if I have understood your latest newsletter correctly and you are indeed thinking of offering a service giving individual advice, I think that would be really useful.

Now I have had sometime to recover from completing the form, I am having to face up to the fact I will be hearing the outcome of my ESA application sometime from the DWP, and I need to be prepared. Please could you advise on what information I need to ask them for when I receive their decisions in order to deal with whatever the outcome is - unless they put me in the Support Group first time I will have to ask for the mandatory reconsideration and then appeal if that fails - can you tell me what forms and information I need to ask them for after I receive their decision in order to do this? Or, if I (fingers crossed) get a good decision, what I need to ask for to find out when it will be reviewed and anything else I should probably know?

Thank you.

Hi ctts,

Hopefully you will be placed into The SG.

You can gen up on Mandatory Reconsideration from the following links :

Mandatory Reconsiderations FAQ's

Disability Rights UK Factsheet - Appeals and Mandatory Reconsiderations.

And our ESA Appeals and MR Guides under the heading of :

"Employment and Support Allowance mandatory reconsiderations and appeals. 40 page guide to mandatory reconsiderations and appeals for ESA, for decisions made on or after 28 October 2013."

On this page :

ESA Claims Guides

bro58

If you do not get the result you are expecting you will want to go through the Medical Assessment Report to see where you point scored and if there is anything you don't think is accurate. They should send you this anyway if you choose to appeal and should be in the appeal papers but you may want to ask for it just in case.

Hi Bro58,

Thanks for that. I've already had a quick skim through the new mandatory reconsiderations & appeals guide (thanks to those who have produced it), and will be looking at the other info you've given me there. Is there anything not mentioned in there that I need to ask the DWP for in relation to how a decision is reached? If I do get in the Support Group, how do I find out when I may be reassessed, and what else should I / can I find out from the DWP?

Thanks again.

Cheers Puccalove.
They haven't asked me for a 'medical' so far. I had to send my form in by 30th September. Can anyone say how long it usually takes /may take them to ask a person in for a 'medical' if they are going to do so?

Thanks.

Hi ctts,

See : How often will I be reviewed

With respect to finding out the recommended length of the award, (the prognosis) and reasons why you were placed into a particular group or found fit for work, see :

ESA medical – what forms to ask for?

From our :

ESA FAQ’s

Any relevant documentation as above can be requested using a SAR :

SAR Form Download

From this page :

DWP Data Protection Policy

See also : IB, IS, SDA, Migration to ESA FAQ’s

bro58