Do I keep quiet or report for potential benefit fraud?

[Keepnoseoutorreport]

I've namechanged (feel free to check with HQ)

So an acquaintance has had anxiety for years, claims PIP and can't work. I have anxiety too and know how crippling it can be it's absolutely horrific and find at its worst it stops me engaging in a social life, stops me sleeping, and I can barely function. So I'm not without sympathy.

However. This acquaintance has for the past 6 weeks without fail been out 2 or 3 times a week on big nights out, music gigs, hen dos etc and posted the photos all over facebook. In the next post the next day moaning that she is broke, too unwell to work and scared of losing her PIP

Now I'm getting pretty sick of it and feel she is taking the piss a bit and the way I see it I have a couple of options;

1. congratulate her on her recovery and quietly suggest she minds her Facebook closer as people may not take kindly to her posts

2. report her to dwp

3. seethe, delete and ignore and let her trip herself up in due course.

I'm torn between 1 and 3 in all honesty.

Is your gripe that if she can manage to go on these nights out etc then she can manage to get a job?

Stop calling her a friend and stay out of her life, OP. She doesn't need 'friends' like you.

And get some empathy and imagination. Despite being autistic I have sufficient of both to realise that this person may still be able to do these things yet have disabling anxiety because every lived experience is different. Anxiety is the biggest, most problematic part of my autism so I too know it well but wouldn't assume it's the same as yours or this person's.

I would report.

MN seem to love defending benefit fraudsters

@BishopBrennansArse has it spot on.

Anxiety manifests in many different ways, all difficult and distressing. For example many posters upthread have explained their anxiety manifests when they’re alone, which is the absolute opposite of mine, I crave solitude and in fact need it to control my anxiety.

I can cope with certain situations but not others.

MN doesn’t defend “benefit cheats”, MN speaks out when people labelling are others cheats without knowing the full facts. It is not the same thing.

3, definitely. For once I agree with the mind your own business stance. You’ve no idea how her anxiety manifests and just because you have it, doesn’t mean it’s the same for her. You even said how your own affects you when you’re bad, so you know it’s not necessarily there all the time.....

What would you even report? You don’t have to stay in the house just because you’re too ill to work. To me her behaviour sounds like a symptom of her mental illness not someone taking the p so as not to work and claim benefits.

If you’re that bothered, apply for PIP yourself, you can get it whilst you’re working.

How is it benefit fraud?

I have Bipolar 2, anxiety and BPD. I no longer work and claim ESA. I gave up on PiP as I didn’t have the strength to appeal.

According to my FB I’m living the life of Riley, lunches out, diy, days out with kids, nights out with DH.

These are the things I post because the days when I can’t get out of bed or leave the house or when carve my arms up or take all my pills for the month or when I’m such a mess DH has to take time off work to be on suicide watch, those days I don’t tend to post much about.

Keep your fucking nose out.

Do you know what her Pip award is for OP - care or mobility, or whether she got the award at the lower or higher levels? Do you know what points she received for which activities?
I'm guessing the answer is no, so you are not in a position to decide whether her ability to get out and socialise is relevant to her benefit or not.

3
I am usually a "report" advocate - but as others have said PIP is an independence payment. If she were claiming ESA it might not be so straightforward.

I do agree though that the problems with benefits are that they are rarely perceived to be fairly allocated and the systems of assessment are either ineffectual or brutally humiliating - or both.

I think it's also pathetic that the OP's first response to a friend possibly making some progress in dealing with a debilitating illness is to think "I should report her for benefit fraud". Talk about a hostile environment for disabled people in action!

I think it's also pathetic that the OP's first response to a friend possibly making some progress in dealing with a debilitating illness is to think "I should report her for benefit fraud". Talk about a hostile environment for disabled people in action!

I agree with this. On another thread someone compared the Tory propaganda about reporting suspected benefit fraud to the Soviet propaganda of the 80s requiring people to spy on their neighbours. It’s disturbingly similar.

Some horrible attitudes here. Some people seem to think that if you're unable to work that you should be at home all day every day and spend no penny of your benefit whatsoever on something you might actually enjoy or which might raise your quality of life. Some also thing that if you claim PIP and work you are a fraud. They have no clue that PIP is NOT an out of work payment; that's ESA.

Shock horror: woman with horrible anxiety actually manages to enjoy herself on occasion. Let's stop that in its tracks! How dare she! She should hide away and not even interact with anyone ever, and certainly never share her fleeting moments of joy on FB.

Perhaps going out like that actually eases the crippling pain of anxiety for a while for this woman?

I hate all the scrounger/striver rhetoric so much. It seems it's as alive as it ever was :(

Op, leave this woman alone and be happy that she gets some happiness in her barricaded life.

I am erring on a "lovely to see you on the road to recovery, long may it last!"
You sound spiteful and petty. Has it occurred to you that she may have another illness? She may be in a manic phase? You suffer from anxiety and think you know everything there is to know about it? How would you feel about people judging you in this way? Stop judging others on things you actually know very little about because when it comes down to it, you know about your anxiety and how it affects you, not anyone else's.

i just always feel sorry for the friend in stuff like this. They think theyre talking to an actual friend, and being open and honest about their life, but actually, no, theres a lot of people who will look for any transgression to fuck you over and spy on you and report you.

1984

Nothing she is doing is benefit fraud - going out dancing etc is nit firbidden just because she gets PIP. You sound quite a nasty person

As someone who doesn't get PIP, but does have chronic conditions, don't assume that what you see is what is happening.

Yesterday, if you asked anyone who saw me, they would have said I was fine. The reality was that I had a banging migraine all day, I got to work and faked every smile, every chatty exchange. I plodded through my work, made many errors and used far too much tippex tape as I realised I'd written the wrong name, wrong values, etc., in my records. I had to correct myself over and over as I saw mistake after mistake. I found it hard to add two numbers together. I was slow and inefficient. I got home and had to entertain my in-laws, which was painful, but as they were here from France, had to be done. When they left at 5.30pm, I went to bed and stayed there all evening.

That's what it's like for me. Often. But people see me being 'fine'.

Agreed - you are no friend. If anxiety manifested itself in everyone the same do you think they’d be as much of a stigma about it? I’m so glad that when I had 7 weeks off work my friends were the complete opposite of you. They asked each day how I was but in a ‘how you doing Fos?’ way, asked if I wanted them to come over, communicated by text and messenger until they knew I was feeling strong and still invited me on evening outs to try and keep normality in my life until I felt strong again. I am able to work and not one of my workmates accused me of swinging the lead but encouraged my therapy hobby and told me to come back only when ready.

Because that’s how true friends are.

If your friend had Cronic Fatigue Syndrome would you want to report them if they pictured themselves out of bed?

@greendale17 How is she a benefit fraud? Where on a PIP form does it say you can't go out?

You don’t know the details of her claim. You can’t report her for fraud for going out- especially with other people that she knows. How do you know what her friends were doing to support her? You’ve only seen some photos of her out for a few hours.

I’ve taken people with autism to gigs, pubs etc because they wanted to go. They still needed 24 hour care though, and needed support prior to getting there, to get there, and to be able to stay there, and get home. But to everyone else we would have looked like friends on a night out. You can’t go by what you see, especially on FakeBook.

I recieve pip for a physical condition that means I'm also in varying levels of pain.
When I go out with friends and drink prosecco I am out of pain - alcohol does that.
If you saw me out and about you would have no idea I have to self inject chemotherapy drugs once a week.
Sometimes I just want a day to feel supple and out of pain - it's great pyschologically.

What's it to you? Why are you making this your business?

You can have crippling anxiety and depression, but still go out some times socially, and actually feel a bit better and maybe even for a moment forget everything and enjoy yourself, and feel good/happy etc.

People with PIP are allowed out, OP.

They don't want to know about a change of circumstances unless it is
For the majority of the time (2 or 3 nights in one week is not the majority of the time)
and
Improvement (or decline) lasting over six consecutive months

So, your 'friend' has got to be doing more well than I'll for over 6 months before you will be perceived as anything but a jealous trouble maker.

You have no idea how hard it is for people to get PIP now, and the stress of having a hidden disability criticised is huge. Try not to be that person! Be bigger than that!

Stop being a dick OP.

Have you seen the categories you get graded on for PIP? It is much, much harder than DLA. The hoops people have to jump through for a pittance is unbelievable. It is not a system that is easily abused by claimants. You reporting things will cause a lot of hassle for your friend and it won't be dealt with in a timely manner as there's a huge backlog and they've got got the staff to get through it all.

Not all disabilities are visible. Some days are worse than others, and youre graded on your assessment day. The PIP system is so unfair and designed to try and make less people eligible, that it's highly unlikely she is faking it.b

God, commenting again as I'm so annoyed. I bet the people saying "if she's well enough to go out for an evening, she's well enough to work" would also be the first to complain if they were working with someone who took a lot of sick days, or couldn't do significant chunks of their job, or might need lots of time off for medical appointments etc. There's just this ridiculous false binary in this country at present where either the expectation is that someone can manage 9-6, 5 days per week, 3 or fewer sick days per year, or they are so unwell they can't leave their room. If you don't fit either extreme you are pilloried. It's vile.