Thanks for replies. Good for you sammicd! Any further info welcome as we are obviously now going to have to pursue the small claims court procedure. Have Monarch set a precedent for passengers on this flight by admitting liability(?) by paying an out of court settlement? Thanks again for replies.

Our first attempt to claim has been dismissed. They say as it was due to the weather then they are not liable to pay compensation. We are not accepting this reply and would appreciate any assistance of information on this subject. Thank you.

I live alone and are in receipt of ESA and PIP, daily living and mobility components both at the standard rate. I have been receiving these benefits for the last three years. I was recently informed that because of the above i should also be in receipt of a severe disability premium. I have never been informed by DWP about this premium and knew nothing of its existence until recently. I have now applied for this premium and have been granted it by DWP but there is a dispute over the length of time this premium can be backdated. On the DWP website it clearly states "You don't have to claim disability premium, it's automatically added to your income support(ESA) if your eligible". I was never informed by DWP of my ability to claim this premium. I am also informed that the award of a premium is effective from the day the qualifying benefit for the premium was awarded. I interpret this as i became entitled to the severe disability premium immediately i was awarded PIP on top of my ESA and the DWP should have informed me. Has anyone any experience of a similar situation to this or any advice please? Thankyou.

Thank you for the replies, very useful. I will commence proceedings and inform you of any progress and results.

I hope i have posted this in the correct forum. We were booked to fly with Monarch from Gibraltar to Luton. Due to weather conditions our flight was diverted from Gibraltar to Malaga. We were due to take off from Gibraltar at 7.30 pm Spanish time and arrive at Luton at 9.30pm English time. We left Gibraltar airport on a bus(provided by Monarch) at11pm Spanish time destination Malaga airport. We arrived at Malaga airport and finally took off from there at 3.00am Spanish time and arrived back at Luton at 5.00am English time. So, basically, we were delayed by 7.5 hours. We were given a carrier bag by Monarch whilst waiting at Malaga airport containing a packet of crisps, chocolate bar and a small bottle of water. We incurred extra costs due to our late arrival back, lifts, taxis,work missed etc. Monarch diverted to Malaga two incoming flights(one of which was ours) that were both due to land at Gibraltar at roughly the same time. It later transpired that Monarch had a broken down plane at Malaga that evening that was due to fly back to the UK. The passengers that were due to fly on that plane were placed on the two diverted planes, one of which was ours. I hope i have explained the situation clearly. Anyone advice on our chance of a compensation claim please? Thank you.

Just a quick update.....as there may be more of you treading the same new PIP path as i am. The adviser arrived and appeared very nice. The adviser had not done a PIP application before and appeared to have some difficulty in completing it on my behalf.. In the end i feel i could probably have done better or at least as well by blindly struggling on and completing the form myself. I wanted to keep the application form the adviser completed on my behalf and submit it myself thereby giving me time to check the form and make any amendments etc. I was informed this was not possible as they had to take the completed form away with them. This was cause for a little concern in my opinion. It is now approaching six months since i applied for PIP. I have not received any communication regarding my application and have been unable to obtain any update on my application when phoning them. One does despair both financially and personally at times!!!!!!!!!! Any advice welcome....as always. So wish there had been a honeybee PIP advice sticky like there was for completing an ESA50!

Thanks for the reply Honeybee13. May i say that if you are the Honeybee that did the sticky on details of how to complete the ESA50 then i would have been lost without your excellent help and thanks for that as well. I am always on the lookout for good news and would love to know why you think this may be so. The appointment letter is from the DWP Disability and Carers Service. All it says is "The Pension Service and the Disability Carers Service work in partnership with other organisations to provide a combined service for our customers". It then goes on to say the name of the person that will visit me at my home address and the date. It does not mention any job title of the person visiting anywhere in the letter. After that it just lists all the relevant documents they need sight of.

I am currently on ESA in the wrag group after migrating from Incapacity Benefit. My health is not good and recently when i visited my local Jobcentre Plus office for my ESA work- focused interview with my personal adviser she advised me to apply for Personal Independence payments due to my condition. She said this would help me financially and also i would not have to struggle to attend any more interviews with her. I applied for PIP by telephone and then a massive PIP claim form arrived. I have had difficulty trying to complete this form(ESA50 is nothing compared to this monster). I telephoned them to say i was having difficulty completing the form. I have now received a letter saying an adviser is coming to visit me at my home address. They say they are coming to assist me with the form and to discuss benefits i am already receiving or may be entitled to, plus to provide information on further services. Has anyone else been through this procedure or can anyone offer any advice please? I hate claiming benefits in this current social climate and am very suspicious(rightly or wrongly) of DWP after all the problems i have had with them and ATOS whilst claiming ESA. I do not know if i have done right by applying for PIP. Should i have applied to go in ESA support group? Will they stop my current ESA payments if i fail on my PIP application? The whole thing worries me so much. Can anyone help please?

After reading this thread and realising i had not received my Xmas bonus i gave DWP a call. I was previously on long term Incapacity benefit and received my Xmas bonus. I was moved onto contribution based ESA and placed in the work related activity group and again i received my Xmas bonus. This year no Xmas bonus received so as mentioned i gave them a call. I was informed that people on means tested benefits are no longer eligible for Xmas bonus only people on contribution based benefits. As i have been receiving ESA for a prolonged period i am apparently on means tested ESA and no longer qualify. The actual amount of benefit i am paid has changed only slightly over the years whilst the name of the benefit i receive has changed numerous times. Can anyone explain or enlighten me on this issue please? Thank you.

Thank you for your replies. I continue to pursue this matter and appreciate the advice. Any more advice/comments appreciated also. What do i want from them or expect them to do? Personally, i felt very hurt by the experience. I now want to hurt them. In my opinion the only way you can attempt to change them is to hurt them financially and by negative publicity. I may only be able to do this in a small way considering their massive size and the little me but i intend to have a go. I also want them to review their systems so that this cannot happen to me again or indeed to anyone else.

Pre Xmas i visited a Tesco store and purchased a few items. I paid for my items and was exiting the store when i was stopped by the store Security officer and the Duty Manager. I was informed that i had been stopped because i had been recognised on their instore security camera as someone who had insulted their staff the week before whilst hastily exiting the store without paying for goods. They held me in the exit area for quite some time(20mins) whilst insisting that i was guilty of theft and that i should admit it as they could prove it with their instore security camera footage. I insisted on my innocence and eventually they let me leave the store. I felt publicly embarrassed and personally intimidated both physically and verbally. Upon leaving the store i felt physically sick. I contacted their customer services centre with full written details of this event. I have received correspondence from them aplogising for the upset and inconvenience the event caused me and stating that the persons involved are having their training re-evaluated. They also enclosed as a gesture of goodwill a gift card to the value of £20. I am very unhappy with the whole situation and their response and feel they haved dismissed my complaint much to lightly and would appreciate any advice on the best way for me to pursue this matter more severely. Thanks again.