yes thats what the solicitor was trying to say i guess. so it looks like im going to be guilty anyway. gutted, because i didnt think i was doing anything wrong. Makes me wonder how anyone on benefits can have any kind of relationship. It certainly will make me fearful in the future. i dont think there is a man on earth who would agree to move in and pay for my kids as soon as the relationship progressed to a staying over stage I was lead to believe that i could only make another claim if i wrote on the form i did live with my ex but now i dont.im going to give your suggestion a try anyway, ill be no worse off than i am now. they are already aware I was in refuge for a year, since thats when i first made a claim. I think im at the reconsider stage so there is still hope i guess. Best I can hope for is that they will understand my need to keep my independance from my ex

Thank you for your advice, i really appreciate it. In hindsight I know the bank thing is going to be difficult to defend, i wish i had never agreed to do it in the first place. I dont know what neighbours think of me because i am pretty much a recluse and i rarely go out unless i need to and i have only lived here around 8 months. i also dont know how my childs school would view my circumstances because my son only started school in sep and as far as i know they dont know anything of my personal circumstances. Family and friends are shocked. they all say, but you're not living with him. i dont have anything here belonging to him without my address on it. he has had all his important stuff delivered to my address because of how much he has moved around even though i have asked him not to. in Jan i refused to pass on his mail and have returned everything to sender. No bills were combined except for him getting a fone for me on contract which i paid for. I didnt think i could get a contract because i was out of work. Now i do not even have that because in Jan when i wouldnt talk to him he tried to make me by blocking the imei numbers rendering it useless. I have a daughter born in the time they say we were living together. He is not her father (not going into that its too personal) I concieved during one of our 'off' periods. there are no details of the father on her birth certificate. I dont know if this helps or hinders my siuation. I suppose at a push I could try to prove he is not the father but i would rather not go down that road I also discovered at one stage my ex was seeing at least 2 other women besides me and was spending time with them while telling me he was renting a room in a shared house, alone. I am now friends with one of these women because of that. will her word or emails between us in the past hold any water? also during 'off' periods we have both had intimate relationships with other ppl. would statements from them hold any water? I dont have many friends and my sister is the only family i have left but would statements from any of them help? i have never thought of asking because i figured their word wouldnt count since they are emotionally connected to me. My ex doesnt have any family either except a brother who as i already mentioned wont vouch for him. I didnt think of asking my doctor for a letter. i have recently changed doctors too so im not sure what they are/are not aware of. I dont recall ever being asked by any of the doctors i have seen if i am single or not, how would they know? i suppose i could ask the HV but she is new too. I dont know how to contact HV's in my previous area at the time he was transferring money to my bank acc we were in a relationship, just not living together. A sp;icitors advice was that i 'must' (he stressed that word) appeal and explain that apart from a few intimate stays. the relationship was volatile with him always saying he would change and there were never any grounds to reasonably expect me to ask him for financial assistance. He also said that the rules were complicated and they no longer have to prove i was living with someone so im confused about that. He didnt want to spend too much time with me because he didnt want to give me false hope so his advice was was scetchy and rushed. but from what i understood it doesnt matter if i lived with him or not they only have to prove a finacial link, which i guess they have by him transferring money to my account and that he did things for me, which he did from around october to jan but not because we were a couple and not at the same time he was transferring money. If thats the case then they pretty much got me for the time between oct 2010 to april 2012 (the time he was transfgerring money) even though i made no finacial gain and was in fact losing money because he always claimed i didnt give him all his money and constantly borrowed money from me. but since april last year all they have is a phone bill in his name which i paid and what i told them in the interview about him helping me through an extremely difficult time. There is not a lot of people who can back me up because /i have a social anxiety disorder and avoid any contact with ppl outside my close circle of family and friends so dont tend to talk to anyone unless i have to. i will look up turn2us, thanks for that. I also intend to fight them all the way because the only thing im guilty of is protecting myslef and my family from a man who at times when he was drunk (most of the time) was abusive. i made sure not to let anyone stay more than the odd night here or there and never to accept any handouts. In the past when i did live with him he controlled everything, never paid any bills and never allowed me money to even buy personal items like deoderant or tampons. i was forced to get all the food we needed for the week on just £10 because he spent the rest on beer and ciggarettes. i had to flee to a womens refuge to get away from him when verabal abuse turned to physical abuse. This time i have children to think about so there was no way i was going to allow him to move in unless he stopped drinking because i would have ended up having to drag them through refuge and be forced to give up my home. scotgal you mention contacting hardship, who are they? sorry if im being stupid i just never heard of hardship. i also dont know what it means to fall under a vulnerable group but im certain my circumstances would be regarded as vulnerable. My HV and psycologist are keeping a close eye on me atm and im waiting a visit from ocupational therapist to get help and support i need in the community. thanks for your kind wishes i think im going to need a lot of luck to get through this

omg, months, or even a year to get through an appeal? thats bad. I dont know where my ex is living ATM, he says 'in his car' but i suspect that is a lie. He also says he thinks he is being followed. If he is, then investigators should know exactly where he is. i dont know about council tax because he has rented rooms and his living arrangements have always been unstable, he never seems to stop anywhere for long. he always seems to upset the ppl he lives with and is asked to leave. I know at least one address he has lived where the people deny even knowing him, i can only guess its because he has obtained money from their address as he has mine and they want nothing to do with it. Even his own brother has denied that my ex lived there for 6 months because he is afraid it will affect his benefits or might upset the housing association because he sub let one of his rooms without telling them. so i dont know how im going to get evidence of where he lived/lives Thanks for taking the time to read and for hitting the triangle for me lol, i didnt know i should do this

ok so back in Jan i had a letter from dwp inviting me for an IUC. I have been accused of living with a partner for the last 3 years. To cut a long story short my ESA payments have been suspended and they are seeking an overpayment. grounds for suspicion well back 3 years ago my ex turned up at my door after losing his job and his home asking for my help. i helped him find somewhere to stay and my family loaned him a considerable amount of money to pay off some of his debts.. during this time we began an intimate relationship. however, he had a lot of problems. he's an alcoholic and smokes in excess of 40 ciggarettes a day. When drinking he becomes abusive and in the past, verbal and mental abuse turned to physical abuse (i was forced into a womens refuge to flee from him). So for that reason i could not let him live with me because unlike the past i had children to think about. When not under the influence of beer he's the nicest person ever.. So we devised a plan.... he would transfer money into my bank. I would buy his ciggarettes for him, pay my family back money he owed and either transfer money to him or give cash if i saw him on a daily basis to cover his living costs.. the idea was that he wouldnt be able to drink and would be forced to cut down on his smoking and everyone would be guaranteed money back that they borrowed him.. it was supposed to lead to him being a better person (giving up eventually both drinking and smoking) and put our relationship in a place where we could live together. Needless to say, it never worked out.. not to go into too much detail i spent every week fighting with him from pay day till mid week (when he was drunk) and the rest of the time he would be trying to convince me it wont happen again, which i always fell for. or i did until some time after april last year. Since then i have not even been in an intimate relationship with him. For a while we were not even in touch till he lost his job and his home again qround 7 months ago. I have medical issues, mental and physical which have left me unable to do normal day to day things and need a lot of support from family and friends. i got most of my support from my sister, who became pregnant and suffered some complications which left her unable to to provide the level of support she had previously. I moved house and a few weeks later i was burgled. I was already struggling to cope alone and my ex was only too happy to jump to my aid when natuarally i was scared to sleep i my house alone because during the burgulary my daughter heard someone enter the bedroom of my 2 younger children, aged just 5 and 9 months at the time. i asked him to stay on a few occations in the aftermath and during this time my mental health took a serious nose dive and i stopped functioning as a normal person would. my ex was doing practically everything around the house and looking after my younger children when my elder daughter was not at home. sometimes after the children hhad gone to bed he stayed at my house and used the internet. i discovered after i was invited for an interview that he was sometimes falling asleep on the sofa. So again to cut a long story short, thinking i had done nothing wrong i went along to the interview. I didnt know they were going to accuse me of living with him for the last 3 years. I thought the problem was only that recently my ex stayed more than he should have and i felt confident i could clear that up and that it wouldnt happen again because i had already asked my ex to stay away when i had discovered he was 'falling asleep' so even though i had not even been in contact with him between jan and about 4 weeks ago (when he became homeless again) the dwp has decided that i was and is still living with him. for almost a month i have been relying on a credit card, but thats going to run out of funds pretty soon. Im really not living with him and i dont know what i am supposed to do. i have spoken to the dwp and been advised of only 2 paths i can take. Either i make a new claim, where i will have to explain what happened between me and my ex (admit we DID live together, but not now) or i have to appeal, which can take weeks. I have of course written an appeal with a full explanation but in the meantime im worried sick because i have letters coming from everywhere all jumping on the back of a supposed over payment of benefits. Housing benefit is demanding proof of my ex's earning so they can adjust how much housing benefit i get. The same for council tax benefit.. I am seriously worrying i wont even be able to feed my children and will be forced to put them in care and will end up losing my home because i dont have the info they want because my ex does not live with me. I have taken legal advice and have been told that the DWP have complicated rules and dont even have to prove that you have been living with someone to do this. I can only hope that my personal situation was enough to prove that it would not have been reasonable to ask my ex for financial assistance due to his lifestyle. I feel like im in a no win situation, and to make matteres worse my ex is ready and willing to move in saying he will change, which i know he wont.. what if they say i am living with him still after the appeal? i will either be forced to do what my ex wants or i wont be able to feed my own children. Tough choices which are seriously affecting my mental health to a point wherei feel suicidal because i see no way out