Hi - I'm new here and have just joined

[squirrelly Whirley]

Hello everyone, I hope it's appropriate to introduce myself here.

 

My tribuneral hearing at HMCATS was refused, I did score 9 points, but I needed 15 or more. From start to finish this appeal took 18 anxious months from the day ATOS medical gave me their "null-point" assessment. I hope this is a place to find some good advice on what to do next.

 

Because of where I stay (bang in the heart of Glasgow, ironically) I struggled to find any help since most agencies seem to work around the borders of the city. I was left feeling totally despondent when I finally figured that out. I must have made a hundred calls on my mobile phone to various "supporting bodies", and was ready to give in when I at last found some local-ish representation through the social work dept who found me a welfare rights officer and a lawyer to gather medical evidence.

 

With my heart condition, I managed to score 9 points on Point 1© of the descriptor. Apparently this means I can't walk more than 100 metres without "significant discomfort" (painful breathlessness; dizziness; nausea; significant exhaustion, etc..) The appeal board ignored anything else. I maintained that I'd have difficulty standing and sitting at a work station - though I find that the new paperwork limits the points available to someone with my heart condition..

 

 

Despite the fact that we failed, I'm amazingly grateful to my WRO, who was fantastic. She managed to make time for me despite a massive workload. I wouldn't even have known where to begin with the complexity of this new appeal setup.(Everything was so much easier when we still had access to community law-centres, before that funding was cut) This said, I did spot a bit of tension and drama between my WRO and the female judge - not sure if I could claim this affected the point-scoring (I reckon my side would have won in a battle of handbags, if it came to it )

 

Funnily enough. I see the 9 points awarded as a victory. We still lost, but at least an admission has been made that something is wrong. I've endured long months where I thought nobody believed me, and I was making it all up.

 

I had phoned the tribuneral to arrange a taxi. Stupidly I answered a question that I had been on a bus some days ago - that was it, NO TAXI for me! The call-centre operator decided that since I had endured one bus trip, I could do so again (and two managers backed him up!). I'd to drag myself onto two buses for the journey across town to the HMCATS building. I was pretty wrecked physically when I got there and it took about 20 minutes to get my breath back and stop my heart thumping wildly in my chest.

 

Now, I don't have a clue what to do. :violin:My resources are more or less spent. I don't have any credit left for my phone. I'm about 2 miles from the nearest JCP, and food and gas is running low. Almost hopeless, I need a source of reliable information about what steps to take next.

 

Sorry this is so long (I feel like this is a long winge). I'd be grateful for any help I can get from the members here

[fightingback99]

More knowlegable posters will be along later in the day to help. However meantime as 6 months have passed since you were first told you'd failed your ESA assessment, you can submit a new ESA claim, and be paid assessment ESA rate again. You'll also need new fit notes from your GP.

 

If you're out of food just now, you can ask CAB or your WRO to issue you with a voucher to access a foodbank to keep you going till your ESA payments restart.

 

And welcome to the forum.

[Helen2264]

Hello everyone, I hope it's appropriate to introduce myself here.

 

My tribuneral hearing at HMCATS was refused, I did score 9 points, but I needed 15 or more. From start to finish this appeal took 18 anxious months from the day ATOS medical gave me their "null-point" assessment. I hope this is a place to find some good advice on what to do next.

 

Because of where I stay (bang in the heart of Glasgow, ironically) I struggled to find any help since most agencies seem to work around the borders of the city. I was left feeling totally despondent when I finally figured that out. I must have made a hundred calls on my mobile phone to various "supporting bodies", and was ready to give in when I at last found some local-ish representation through the social work dept who found me a welfare rights officer and a lawyer to gather medical evidence.

 

With my heart condition, I managed to score 9 points on Point 1© of the descriptor. Apparently this means I can't walk more than 100 metres without "significant discomfort" (painful breathlessness; dizziness; nausea; significant exhaustion, etc..) The appeal board ignored anything else. I maintained that I'd have difficulty standing and sitting at a work station - though I find that the new paperwork limits the points available to someone with my heart condition..

 

 

Despite the fact that we failed, I'm amazingly grateful to my WRO, who was fantastic. She managed to make time for me despite a massive workload. I wouldn't even have known where to begin with the complexity of this new appeal setup.(Everything was so much easier when we still had access to community law-centres, before that funding was cut) This said, I did spot a bit of tension and drama between my WRO and the female judge - not sure if I could claim this affected the point-scoring (I reckon my side would have won in a battle of handbags, if it came to it )

 

Funnily enough. I see the 9 points awarded as a victory. We still lost, but at least an admission has been made that something is wrong. I've endured long months where I thought nobody believed me, and I was making it all up.

 

I had phoned the tribuneral to arrange a taxi. Stupidly I answered a question that I had been on a bus some days ago - that was it, NO TAXI for me! The call-centre operator decided that since I had endured one bus trip, I could do so again (and two managers backed him up!). I'd to drag myself onto two buses for the journey across town to the HMCATS building. I was pretty wrecked physically when I got there and it took about 20 minutes to get my breath back and stop my heart thumping wildly in my chest.

 

Now, I don't have a clue what to do. :violin:My resources are more or less spent. I don't have any credit left for my phone. I'm about 2 miles from the nearest JCP, and food and gas is running low. Almost hopeless, I need a source of reliable information about what steps to take next.

 

Sorry this is so long (I feel like this is a long winge). I'd be grateful for any help I can get from the members here

 

You need to explain more in details how your heart conditions affect you when you are walking, sitting or standing and how many days and throughout the day you experience severe discomfort! Since that phone call if your circumstances has changed for the worst and you need a taxi you could try the tribunal again saying you are more under stress and cannot travel by bus explain why if taking a bus how you feel what symptoms do you get, are you more stress that your heart beat is more rapid and what happens when your heart is beating rapid, out of breath, cannot move, feeling you are going to pass out, feeling the need to lie down, become very anxious there won't be no one to take care of you and see you to your journey back home, explain why it would be safer for you to journey by taxi instead of by bus!

 

What you've endured before doesn't mean you can endure again, symptoms can change for day to day from bad to worst!

 

Hope this helps

[squirrelly Whirley]

Thanks for your support Fightingback and Helen. It's good to finally find somewhere to unburden.

 

As regards food, I have a small horde of tins and packets gathered over the last year and a half. I think that will have to stretch as long as it takes. The CAB unfortunately proved useless early in my search for aid in structuring and submitting my appeal. They are literally just around the corner, but didn't prove very helpful at the time. I have problems sitting, standing and walking distances - walking to one of these foodbanks would be pretty much impossible for me.

 

WIth respect to my completed appeal, my first-tier appeal is over, I can apparently appeal to a higher-tier only if my WRO can detect any disparity in the legal manner by which the first-tier implemented government policy.

 

I'd already approached my local councillor regarding the taxi, but with less than a week to act and knowing that bureaucracy takes time to get into gear, I felt I'd handed her a task from mission-impossible.

 

I maintain that this was a clear case of discrimination against the disabled. Why should I be forced to reveal intimate details of my condition to a strange call-centre worker, unskilled in medical matters let alone cardiology. Perhaps they should simply tattoo our foreheads with triangles, issue bells and signs to warn the general public that we are "unclean".

 

I am grateful for her help thusfar, but I won't allow my councillor to rest. I also see a possibility of engaging my MP and SMP to this cause. This taxi-affair is an outrage! Where else would it be necessary to reveal the most intimate of medical details to a complete stranger in a call-centre? This represents an attack targetting those least able to defend themselves in their time of greatest need.

 

I'm sure it would represent a winnable, easy-fight. Something they may well relish; particularly since it might have so many potential voters watching and reading about it in the popular media.

 

Now... how far away is that election again?

[citizenB]

I see you are in Scotland - Govan Law centre apparently provides free legal advice/resources.

 

 

I'd advise you to seek advise from Liberty. Their "your rights" website has information on it, and you can download a form to ask something specific.

 

Also try the equality and human rights commision.

 

The Scottish human rights commision can point you in the right direction to legal advise, if you are in Scotland.

 

Also if you are in Scotland, try the Govan law Centre, a free legal resource which provides legal advice on many issues including Social Welfare which ESA falls within. (Scottish charity no. SCO30193).

[Nystagmite]

Sorry to hear this. There's criteria about picking up and carrying. Would that not apply to you? I mean if you can't mobilise 100 meters, it would be reasonable to also suggest that picking up and carrying something whilst mobilising (not that I've tried it) wouldn't be that easy either.

[squirrelly Whirley]

I see you are in Scotland - Govan Law centre apparently provides free legal advice/resources.

 

Hi citizenB,

 

Thanks for your input, I've looked at the Equalities and human rights commission link, and they may be just the right organisation to help me, since I must expect future trips to their doors.

 

I had been phoning around on numbers I'd found on the web. I had called The Govan Law Centre, but they told me they couldn't offer help since I lived outwith their operating area. (They did point me in the direction of the Legal Services Agency on Renfrew St, who gathered my medical evidence).

 

I do stay within the reach of the former East End law centre, but that facility closed due to government funding cuts. My WRO mentioned to look up 'Jacqueline Doyle' on the internet, who previously worked at the East End Law Centre, but is now based on the Gallowgate.

 

I'll be making an appointment soon to get help filling forms relating to a new applications for PIP and reapplying for ESA, and the expected medical.

[squirrelly Whirley]

Hi Mystagmite,

 

Unfortunately I have no problems lifting and carrying the likes of empty boxes or light shopping, as was pointed out in the ATOS medical documentation, thanks in any case for considering the wider options.

 

These new descriptors seem harder to gain any points from. I feel the legally-precise wording is difficult to argue against for the common man in the street. There are so many points where one thing stated in your own defence in one descriptor may conflict harshly with the criteria stated in another. I recognise that I have problems picking up coins - so I get down on my hands and knees. This then implies that I can (easily) get down onto my knees ... and up again.

 

I had a discussion with my WRO about feeling dizzy on climbing a ladder to wash windows and change light bulbs. Perhaps my problems with balance and ladders conflicts with the fact that I live in a flat on the upper floor of a tenement, and must therefore climb stairs to get to my front door.

 

The ATOS medical document also tells me that I have no problems doing housework - though I can't remember talking about that in the shorter than 20 minute interview. There were certainly other things that the interviewer added - I assumed these had been extracted from notes made in previous assessments.

 

We argued at the tribunal against 'sitting and standing at a workstation', but that was seemingly ignored.

 

When each day is defined as good-day or bad-day, every subsequent day tends to become pretty much like the last, you adapt and learn to cope. I think my greatest difficulty was remembering that this appeal related to a 18-month old medical.

[fightingback99]

Concentrate on getting your new ESA claim up and running . Ana ppeal to the Upper Tribunal needs expert advice, and you don't get paid while it's on he go. so you'll need a new application in anyway to receive any funds.

 

With regard to the ,moving an empty cardboard box' question, depending on what your heart condition problem is, you might be surprised to find it's more difficult than you initially think to move it repetetively. I've got cardiac neuropathy and any repetetive lifting with arms, just trying to put a few things in an upper kitchen cupboard can make me dizzy. It's not the weight so much it's the upward movement of the arms. Try it a couple of times and see if it affects you.

[squirrelly Whirley]

Thanks fightingback, I appreciate what you say about the movement versus the weight aspect within the empty-box question. Stupidly, I thought this was some sort of trick question, since there must be few jobs which require you to manoeuvre an empty box - I thought any answer I gave on this point would be shot down easily. I do lose power fairly rapidly when I'm looking through clothes on a rail, I'd just never seen that in the context of the empty box problem. I see now that moving a box has much more to it than it may first seem.

 

I received a request with respect to DLA for ID. The DWP provided a list of acceptable documents - I sent my birth certificate and my rent card (both of which are relatively easier to replace than my passport).

 

I'm getting into the practice of scanning everything into my computer, coz it's easier than stacking up the mountain of paperwork.

 

I telephoned the ESA application line early so I wouldn't have to wait hours to place a new claim. The woman was recording my details, then said she'd had a problem and would send me out a paper-copy of the forms to fill in. This leaves me feeling a little bit suspicious - I bet my claim is more complex since I'm claiming ESA from the day after my appeal.

 

Once I get this form, I'll hopefully get help completing it from the solicitor my WRO told me about. (I'm assuming I'll be able to get a short-term loan from a friend, so I can catch a bus to where she is, and that a claim for legal aid will be allowed).

[RaeUK]

Well, you've failed once but don't be disheartened. On the plus side, you now have some experience of the procedure and the types of evidence you're going to need. Don't chuck out any evidence of your medical condition you have. Keep it and add to it for use later.

As has been said, don't forget about the repetitive nature of tasks. Just because you can do it once, doesn't mean each time isn't harder and harder.

Does your condition affect your stamina? Does it lead to chronic fatigue? These are worth bearing in mind.

It took me three applications, two failed WCAs and two failed Tribunals before I was put straight into the Support Group. So I understand the bloody mindedness and determination you'll need. It can be done. I had no help at all btw. (Apart from the excellent support of CAG.)

[**Margaret**]

:squirrelly Whirley:

 

Sorry your appeal was dismissed but if your doctor's prepared to write Med 3 (unfit) notes, 'what to do now' is to get a new claim for employment n support allowance prepared. Have Jobcentreplus processed the tribunal decision yet? Either written to you or simply stopped your assessment rate payments? If not, it'll be the reason you couldn't make a telephone claim. It isn't that your new claim's more complex, simply that a new claim will be rejected until the old one's closed cos the technology can't cope. Doubt legal aid will be available to complete an ESA1 claim form but you don't really need it. There's an example of the form at;

 

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/esa1-print.pdf

 

When ESA50 time comes around there's a (slightly dated but still very useful) guide at;

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?316210-ESA50-Guide

 

As your main problem appears to be a heart condition you can probably do most, if not all, of the physical activities but the regs require that they be done reliably and repeatedly. In a era of increasingly harsh regs if you can sit at a table to eat a meal, then move to the sofa to watch television for an hour, you're unlikely to score points for sitting and standing unless the effort involved causes breathlessness or you're unable to sit/stand for an entire morning without rest periods.

 

Not sure where you're going with the equalities issue. Whilst I understand your sentiments, the degrading system treats all of us the same. It's our penalty for daring to be disabled.

 

Best wishes, Margaret.

Edited August 6, 2013 by **Margaret**

[squirrelly Whirley]

Hi Starryeyes

 

Thanks for your kind words with respect to my appeal. I believe my WRO is strongly considering a higher appeal, I live in hope.

 

As regards the taxi issue, I'm taking a stand because I feel the decision made by the HMCATS call-centre was too hasty in light of my disabling condition (which they didn't even acknowledge).

 

I wanted to attend this tribunal as I saw it as vital to securing points the ATOS nurse hadn't awarded. The other option was to let the 0-point ATOS decision stand, and I disagreed greatly with that. In the event, I gained 9-points. Not enough for my award of ESA to continue, but enough to demonstrate there is a problem. (I felt I'd already gone 18 months under the suspicion there was nothing wrong with me)

 

HMCATS had provided me with taxis to previous tribunals. On this occasion, the call-centre operative asked me if I had been on a bus recently. I confirmed I'd taken a bus some days previously. That was all he needed to know - no further questions - no further analysis needed. Result: no quick 5 minute taxi ride for me!

 

On speaking to his manager, she confirmed this strict ruling. I got the feeling that nothing I could have said could or would change the outcome. I don't think I'm unique in this. I maintain that this decision could so easily have deprived me of my right to a fair hearing.

 

Personally, buses are a tense and costly means of travel. I only take them when I absolutely have to. On a good day, I might have relatively few problems, but distance, pot-holes and bad suspension are my undoing. On a bad day, I am fairly exhausted by the walk to the bustop. My solution is simple: don't leave the house on bad days.

 

Unfortunately, good days have a habit of turning into bad days if I have to stand, or there is an overlong journey, or a traffic-jam for instance.

 

Good day or bad, my heart rate climbs proportional to how physically tired I feel. A short bus-journey of a mile or two is made longer (and my discomfort increases) as other passengers get on and off. At the end of such a journey, it's hard enough to safely get off the bus without at least stumbling. By that point, breathing is painful, laboured and hard; I can manage perhaps 10 paces before I'm forced to stop and catch my breath, When I get through me door, I just go to bed and try to recover.

 

Sorry this rant is so long - I'm still quite angry about this whole thing

[RaeUK]

... I believe my WRO is strongly considering a higher appeal, I live in hope. ...

But please don't let that stop you putting in a fresh claim. I believe they can run concurrently.

[squirrelly Whirley]

Thanks RaeUK,

 

I believe any new appeal to higher authorities at HMCATS would take several months, I guess this is due to the volume of people going through the same process.

 

The new applications for ESA and PIP are in the post, plus, I'm seeing my GP to obtain a new med3 next week.

 

I'm certainly more organised and informed now that I've found this site

[**Margaret**]

:squirrelly Whirley:

 

away. I've done it often enough, although in my case it's more likely to be cos of something that Atos have done or not done.

 

Can see where you're coming from now. A feeling that the outcome of your tribunal was prejudiced cos you were exhausted by the effort of getting there. Like Atos, tribunal support staff tend to assume a short trip into town is the same as two buses across town. But they're not medically qualified and should have suggested a written request for a taxi with a supportive letter from your doctor. Surprised that your welfare rights adviser didn't intervene.

 

Should your welfare rights adviser find grounds for further appeal it'll be at least two to three months for a set aside and up to a year before another appeal hearing.

Best wishes, Margaret,

[squirrelly Whirley]

Hi Starryeyes, thank you for your comments. I appreciate the timeline for appeals - I optimistically thought this would be wrapped up a lot quicker than you outlined above.

 

Ordinarily I would agree, at a purely personal level, the taxi problem might be adequately described as being a prejudiced decision. My first thought was "this is so unfair", then I started thinking about all the other disabled people who had been denied taxis and were otherwise unable to get to their city-centre location using public transport.

 

HMCATS claim to be independent of both ATOS and the DWP, yet, through their own efforts to save petty-cash, they're doing the same job. How many zero-point awards from ATOS are confirmed by tribunals where the subject is not ready and willing to defend themselves against ATOS lies? (I'll bet DWP managers jump for joy when that happens)

 

I claim this denial demonstrates discrimination and an ethical bias supporting the DWP and ATOS in their position against myself and the disabled at large.

 

Not only was this decision made blindly by a call-centre worker, it was supported by two levels of hierarchy above - none of whom are medically unqualified.

 

Signed: Tired and annoyed