To think this “crackdown” on benefit fraud is absolutely pathetic

Has anyone else been asked to submit bank statements over a long term claim except at the start?

@birelonel , I have been on sickness and disability benefits for 25 years. I have twice been asked to submit bank statements as well as at the start. Once in 2017 and once in 2019.

@AutumnCrow, absolutely. A major form of LC has some overlapping symptoms with M.E, may not turn out identical but cousins certainly. ME is usually preceded by a viral infection. Medical authorities harmfully trivialised (ME for years stymying biomedical research and development of effective treatments. Seem to be at risk at repeating this with LC. Much more funding for biomed research needed for both illnesses. Instead authorities seem to just want to blame patients and cut sickness benefits. Cruel and shortsighted economically too.

Re long covid stats, the last ONS report in March 2023 estimates of the prevalence of self-reported long Covid indicated that 1.9 million people in the UK were experiencing long Covid representing 2.9% of the population. Of these, around 1.3 million people had symptoms that had lasted for more than a year and 762,000 had symptoms lasting for more than two years. 381,000 (20%) reported that their ability to undertake their day-to-day activities had been “limited a lot”.

Another analysis analysis showed that almost a third of people with long covid reporting symptoms at 12 weeks will have recovered within a year, leaves two thirds that hadn’t at one year . ME can be v debilitating and chronic for vast majority, a proportion of LC will probably be chronic too.

This isn’t about supporting the disabled back into work. It’s yet another attack on sick and disabled people - this time introducing conditionality where there was none before, specifically aimed at forcing the most sick and disabled to look for work. And it’s futile. The resulting savings won’t be a drop in the ocean compared to what would be saved if they put the same zealous effort into cracking down on tax evasion.

@Rosscameasdoody, agree. Thanks for update.

@Seymour5 Yes I do understand but it also true that the care component (mid to high) of DLA and the daily living component of PIP and AA also gives extra money on pension credit whilst mobility does not.

You seem to think that tax avoidance is illegal. It’s not.

@Rosscameasdoody Freedom of Information are powerful but slow ways to extract information from government departments. Parliamentary Questions, asked by an MP are faster and generate more heat within the department.
Support groups need to make co-ordinated requests to pin down areas that DWP wish to exploit.
Purdah or the pre-election period is the five or six weeks before an election in which no policy announcements can be made to avoid electoral advantage and I suspect that FoIs and PQs will be put on hold for the same reason.
As much information as possible needs to be in the public domain before the next election - the vast amounts of data held by DWP mean that there is no good reason for anyone not receiving the benefits they are entitled to.

@Rosscameasdoody thanks so much for all that information. This might be a stupid question but, will we find out on the 22nd if all this is going ahead and when it will start from etc?

@Oldsu thank-you. The reason I asked is a friend, whose mobility was becoming increasingly limited, waited til she got her state pension, then applied. If she'd applied and been awarded even a few weeks earlier, she'd have qualified for PIP, including the mobility element.

That would have been better for her than AA, partly because she might have been awarded more money, but also she would automatically have been awarded a BB. So many people seem to think that older people get everything, the difference between disability benefits claimed before and after state retirement age suggests otherwise.

@Seymour5 it was 9 years as he is 74 now, but you can claim anytime after you reach state pension age as long as you have needed the level of care for 6 months, in DH case he was working up to last year but his health has deteriorated due to Diabetes and Heart condition

@Rosscameasdoody yes that makes sense thank you

Out of interest, how long after your husband got his state pension did he claim AA?

https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/news/dwp-ordered-release-information-about-decision-scrap-wca

This is the latest information I can find on the proposed changes to WCA for anyone interested. A poster upthread mentioned that she had submitted a freedom of information request on this subject. She’s unlikely to get a reply as the DWP are invoking legislation enabling them to resist FOI requests and they have currently not even complied with an order from the information commissioner to disclose background information on the changes. This article is from the disability news service, who have been actively campaigning against the changes.

The proposal is to scrap the WCA from 2029 but in the meantime the government is trying to push through changes to it which would drastically reduce the number of seriously ill and disabled people who qualify for benefit. There is a proposal to introduce a new ‘health element’ on UC to replace LCWRA. This would be linked to PIP and would effectively mean that only those who are on certain rates of PIP would qualify for the extra allowance and not be compelled to look for work or engage with work related activity. Medically unqualified DWP work coaches would be responsible for deciding what type of work and related activity would be suitable for those sick/disabled people now compelled to engage with work related activity.

Given that along with these changes, the DWP plan to remove the issue of fit notes from GP’s and give that responsibility to their own ‘therapists’ these proposals put the fate of the very most sick and disabled entirely into the hands of the DWP. They will oversee from end to end, the process of eligibility for benefit and exemption from job search. And given the appalling track record of quality of decision making for PIP and ESA, it’s not hard to see how this is going to affect the most vulnerable.

This isn’t about supporting the disabled back into work. It’s yet another attack on sick and disabled people - this time introducing conditionality where there was none before, specifically aimed at forcing the most sick and disabled to look for work. And it’s futile. The resulting savings won’t be a drop in the ocean compared to what would be saved if they put the same zealous effort into cracking down on tax evasion.

This is an example of the ‘information sharing’ agreement between benefit claimants and the DWP. When your husband claimed his state pension this would have triggered checks on his NI contributions and liaison with HMRC so this is probably where they have obtained information about previous addresses. DWP also have access to information held by credit reference agencies in certain circumstances, so potentially could have obtained the information there if they had a reason to search his credit files.

It is actually surprising just how much information the DWP has on people, my husband is claiming attendance allowance and was asked some security questions one of which was the address where we lived prior to our current address, when we lived at our old address we had no contact with the DWP at all as we have never claimed benefits and my husband didn't start claiming his state pension until we had already moved to our current address but they still had a record of our old one.

I was moved to UC last year as their were some major cock ups between housing benefit and my housing association. Was in support group, now in LCWRA.

Has not been my experience, or that of the many people I know on ESA and LCRWA.
TBF, I can understand why your FiL was pulled up, as he was depositing into a savings account. But then there was a case of a lady who was pulled up for getting money from a "boyfriend". She was withdrawing her benefits from a PO counter in a McColl store.

Yep. It would be like turkeys voting for Christmas !!

And some of the middle class Covid zealots will be cheering this on
Absolute hypocrites

This tory government know people on benefits aren't voting for them so dont mind shafting them.

Several friends on ESA and UC LCWRA rates. All asked for bank statements every six months prior to Covid, but haven’t been asked since we returned to normal. My FiL was on income support prior to introduction of UC - had to submit bank statements every six months. He was pulled up by DWP because one of his bank statements showed a direct debit to a post office savings account he hadn’t declared. Benefit was suspended while they investigated. The tacit agreement for bank account checks between DWP and the claimant is already there - the proposed new measures are just an extension of that, and with AI will be easier and cheaper to implement.

The banks will notify DWP of large deposits into accounts receiving benefits payments. The DWP can forensically examine your account if they suspect fraud. They can do this before they start an investigation
I’m afraid the best place to keep any savings above £8000 is in a shoebox under the bed. That is if you are claiming benefits.

But the point is they don’t. They crack down on benefit claimants because they’re easy meat and they can sell claimants as layabouts and scroungers to the public, who lap it up. The government know how much they would save if they cracked down properly on tax fraud - and savings from benefit fraud pales in comparison. But they won’t. Three guesses as to why ?

Not me. My experience is the same as yours. I was also never told that I had to declare every incoming (I just had some money off of a relative to help with dental costs... should I be declaring that?).
However, a lot of people are being called in for checks now. Some random, and some to do with people who applied during Covid. They are getting their spending scrutinised.

And yet this time three years ago we in the mini Lockdown 2 with them swearing blind that it was all about the health. If thats the case why are they threatening people with loss of NHS prescriptions if they arent deemed to be looking hard enough for work.

All in it together right? Nah now its fucking obvious it was all about protecting our "betters" Which some of us could see three and a half years ago but is even more obvious now. I guess they cant make as much money from the illnesses people on benefits are being threatened over, as they could from Covid!!!!!

I've claimed means tested benefits of one form or another for over 20 years. I was asked for bank statements at the first application but I have never been asked for them again. I've not known anyone else have to submit bank statements periodically except when they've declared being over the £6k savings threshold and they need to check how much over they are.

Has anyone else been asked to submit bank statements over a long term claim except at the start?