Minefields and Crystal Balls. Och its the DWP/ATOS again. Argh!!!!

I don't often speak about my current personal circumstances but on this occasion it just has to be done.

I have a long term illness called ME or CFS (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) with fybromyalgia, with the added complications of some other issues too which I shall not go into for brevity.

Minefield

Realising I was ill in 2011 I was loathed to get into to the minefield of the UK Benefits system again having been ill all ready between 2005 to 2008. I therefore stayed on Job Seekers Allowance hoping I would get better in the meantime but couldn't cope with the constant harassment of attending unexpected appointments and applying for jobs that I knew that because of my illness I would not be able to do anyway.

Crystal Balls

I was just thinking that today's issue with the ‪#‎DWP‬ is similar to the time my ‪#‎JSA‬ (Job Seekers Allowance) payments were sanctioned for not attending an appointment with my advisor at Parkhead Job Centre. The only issue on that occasion was the fact the letter advising me of aforesaid appointment arrived after aforesaid appointment. So in order to have kept my JSA I would've needed a crystal ball or multiple crystal balls, and the ability to read it/them too of course!

 This is not my experience and nor anyone elses experience who actually lives in the real world.

So currently due to illness I have to suffer the UK sickness benefits system once again, which is enough to make you feel worse before you start, if you or any of the people you know have actually been involved in it. I don't know what world some politicians stay in, or the one constantly portrayed by the mainstream broadcasters i.e. that there are millions of people on these benefits who are actually not ill at all, and are therefore diddling the system. This is not my experience and nor anyone elses experience who actually lives in the real world.

Being on ESA isn't a lifestyle choice anyone with half a brain would chose if they were able to avoid it.

Being on Employment and Support Allowance is not a lifestyle choice anyone with half a brain would chose if they were able to avoid it. Every single year I have been refused it, except oddly this one, and then had to go to tribunal always getting it once the evidence was actually considered and not just dismissed.

This was despite having a long term condition, which caused me additional expenses, which the benefit is actually for.

Therefore with severely limited energy I avoided applying for #DLA or #DisabilityLivingAllowance after my first abortive attempt when despite my evidence being credible my application was refused. This was despite having a long term condition, which caused me additional expenses, which the benefit is actually for.

So this year I decided I would tackle PIP (Personal Independence Payment) the new replacement to DLA which I applied for in March. I am still waiting to be assessed.

Firstly ATOS contacted me to tell me to be patient (well I should have gotten this benefit about 8 years ago so I am that!).

I was contacted in October. After properly looking up where I was exactly to go to be assessed for ‪#‎PIP‬ - I thought it was a ‪#‎Falkirk‬ postcode but it was actually a Business Park outside ‪#‎Stirling‬. How do ‪#‎ATOS‬ expect someone with a disability or long term illness to get there? Is this a cynical ploy to stop folk from ‪#‎Glasgow‬ getting PIP?

However on contacting ATOS, despite this being standard procedure to send people from Glasgow to Stirling for assessments, they stated that in my case they would arrange for one actually in the city I lived.

In my case they would arrange for one actually in the city I lived.

I then waited with bated breath and was not disappointed when a letter from them popped through my letterbox when I was asleep again. Well no surprise there?

A letter arrived from the ‪#‎DWP‬ today advising my ‪#‎PIP‬ (Personal Independence Payment, the new replacement to ‪#‎DLA‬ or ‪#‎DisabilityLivingAllowance‬) application has been unsuccessful. Why? Because the reason I gave for my lack of attendence at my assessment on 31st October 2014 with ‪#‎ATOS‬ at Salus in ‪#‎Glasgow‬ was unsatisfactory. Yet I gave no reason as ATOS themselves cancelled the appointment! You could not make it up!!!!
 
I have to wait for months and months for this crap! You wouldn't need to need the money (which I most definitely do). To think I paid my taxes diligently for years and years when I was working (unlike Gideon and his rich pals) expecting that the Welfare State would be there when I needed it and this is what I end up with!

stop the government from taking disabilty benefit people

Responsible department: Department for Work and Pensions

This petition is to ask the government to stop its current work on changing and removing disability benefits from disabled peoples lives before it gets able-bodied unemployed people and people it put on the disabled list to massage figures from 1980's-present day and to leave disability benefit for those that deserve it and re-instate it for those that deserve it and have lost it. Possibly they could change tactics and chase bankers with huge pensions, tax dodgers and thieves that stole tax payer money to recover the money they are trying to take from disabled people during a time that the cost of living is rising to an all time high in the middle of a recession.

 http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/36522

CHANNEL 4: BRITAIN ON THE SICK

Using undercover filming, reporter Jackie Long investigates the controversial processes used to assess whether sickness and disability benefit claimants should be declared fit for work by the UK Government contractor company ATOS Healthcare. If you are not a cynic beforehand you will be after!

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/4od

PANORAMA: Disabled or Faking It

A thoroughly shocking programme shown on Monday 30th July 2012 on BBC2 showing that people on disability and sickness benefits are being systematically victimised by the UK Government to try to get them back into work with in many cases disastrous or even fatal consequences.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/b01lldrc/

THE CURSE OF BEING ILL IN THE UK TODAY – APPLYING FOR DLA

I recently discovered after being treated for something for 12 years that the diagnosis was wrong. No wonder the medication made no difference, something that I had been telling my ex GP for years (he is no longer my GP!).

Disability Living Allowance or DLA

I was advised that I should make a claim for Disability Living Allowance as my condition is long term, because my expenses are higher because of my illness and I cannot work full time even if I could get a paid job.

I made my application for DLA in January and in March much to my surprise (not!) this was refused (as I am not clinically dead – you think I am joking!?). I returned in late March and placed an application for an appeal.

Waiting time for appeals 13 months

Imagine my surprise(!?) to discover that the waiting time for appeals is currently 13 months!

It is not possible to make a claim for DSA for the first 6 months of your disablement. Add this to the 2 months it took to process the application followed by 13 months to process the appeal one wonders what the purpose of DSA actually is.

The purpose of DSA certainly cannot be to provide the disabled with money if it is requirement to wait a minimum of 21 months before (provided your appeal is successful) the applicant actually receives any. If the disabled actually needed the money then they would have starved as I am yet to hear of anyone who can live 21 months without food or water.

That is ofcourse if they live that long...

It certainly cannot be there to help the disabled either. The fact that new applicants are being systematically refused benefit actually makes those applicants feel worse and also worthless.

And once the applicants get to the promised land of receiving DSA they may only receive £20.55 per week, up to a maximum of £131.50 per week. That is of course if they live that long….