Family member awarded enhanced pip - AIBU?

[Orangecrocs]

My family member has just been awarded enhanced pip in both living and mobility components.
Shes told me that she’s twisted the truth during the assessment and told the assessor that she has lots of pain and can’t really walk at all, but she walks all the time as I see her out and about - we live in a hilly area. I know people who are in a wheelchair and struggle to get enhanced rate - so I really don’t understand how she’s managed this.
I know people will say mind your own business but she’s told me she’s actually lied to them.

Better tell DWP it has got its stats wrong, then.

My old nurse manager claimed it for a back problem but still worked full time

Plenty of people on PIP work full time. It is an in work benefit. I am surprised you don't know that.

Exactly this. I requested the PIP form 3 times before I actually completed it. I couldn't admit that I had a disability. I'm a health care professional, I'm supossed to help others, not need help myself. The interview was so hard, I cried for hours after I finished it. And then doubted myself, maybe I was too negative, maybe I really shouldn't get PIP, maybe I dont deserve, others are worse off than me
And then when I got the letter confirming I was awarded PIP, I cried again. Part of me wanted someone to tell me I don't have a disability.
Those that are genuine often find the process really emotionally challenging, especially their first application.

Very difficult for MN not to be judgmental when it comes to disability benefits. Claimants should sit quietly during the day, and at night cover themselves with a blanket and wait quietly to die, so they’re not too much of a burden to the tax payer. Absolutely no account taken of the fact that a great many people who claim benefits like PIP actually work and are tax payers themselves.

It's so difficult isn't it? With having to admit that your disability is that bad, comes a sense of... Well... Life over then. Some of us still dream of an impossible career!

Likewise with your Mum, my Nan got assessed to have a walk in shower fitted by the council (okay maybe not like your Mum!) she was ooh no I'm fine, look I've even got this exercise bike - shall I show you how I use it?!

Nan! Too stubborn, felt out of the bath within 2 months and copped the cost privately for the shower. I'd only ever seen a washing basket on that bike!

Mumsnet is always very naive when it comes to issues like this. The reality is there are ways to 'scam' the pip system. Mumsnetters largely won't know this, but people who abuse the system pass on their 'tips' to each other. Largely involving illnesses that are hard to prove - mental health, fibromyalgia etc and going to the doctors about these symptoms for 'evidence' and exaggerating to the assessor.

Yes many many people are exaggerating their illnesses to claim PIP. It's a lot easier than working 37 hours a day 5 days a week. The reality is that a lot of these people aren't fit for full time work. They wouldn't last a normal job. Another reality is that standards benefits pay about 400 quid a month which is barely enough to survive on hence the PIP fraud.

If you are able to be a nurse full time you don’t meet the criteria for PIP. Nursing involves moving and handling, running for crash calls, manual dexterity for changing dressings etc.
my friend claim PIP and works full time but she works on an office and isn’t hands on.

PIP isn’t an out of work benefit. It’s a universal benefit paid to contribute to the cost of living with a disability. And it’s a fact that many people who qualify for standard sickness benefits will also qualify for a level of PIP for the same condition. Doesn’t mean they’re claiming either benefit fraudulently - the two benefits are assessed and paid for entirely different reasons.

This…and I’m thinking once on it it how many people ever want to admit to getting better and risk losing what has become part of their income?

I understand this but there are fraudsters who see PIP as a top up to their universal credit.

I have a colleague who claims it for mental health issues whilst spending all day supporting addicts. Not sure what descriptors it was awarded on.

People do realise that PIP isn't an out of work benefit?

Some people receiving it are too unwell to work, but others are working - often because of their PIP.

PIP is, I understand, to pay for the extra costs incurred by their health issues or disability. For some people their PIP is what enables them to work.

Separately I'm still stunned to hear that so many people are apparently cheerfully telling all and sundry - friends, family members, colleagues, neighbours, and casual acquaintances that they're committing fraud. Pretty stupid imo. Presumably if they're so openly telling everyone they know, they're likely to get caught.

Also surprised so many people, including the many many genuine claimants, tell anyone they're claiming benefits given the current climate of stigma and increased disability discrimination.

Yes of course. Uc with LCWRA and PIP can be a similar figure than a full time nmw job.

PIP isnt about whether you can walk or not its awarded on the basis you have a disability.
A disability is classified on the basis of how able you are of carrying out tasks in order to maintain a normal standard of living.

I don't know I am bothering tbh, but that poster said the person in question was a nurse manager.

From the RCN site:

Nurse Managers help patients by managing the nurses who care for them, drawing together patient experience and the coordination of the multidisciplinary team.

They can also play an important role in providing staff with learning and development opportunities. In senior leadership roles, nurse leaders may be involved in managing services or operations, or in commissioning. staff satisfaction; maintaining a safe environment for staff, patients, and visitors; ensuring standards and quality of care are maintained; and aligning the unit's goals with the hospital's strategic goals.

Unless the condition is permanent and unlikely to improve, PIP claimants are regularly reassessed and a great many are actually only in receipt of relatively short term awards because the likelihood of improvement/recovery has been factored in to the decision.

In my experience when I was volunteering helping people fill out such forms (before I became disillusioned with the system), the process encourages people to focus on what they can't do, that then becomes a reward - getting their PIP and then what they 'can't do' becomes part of their identity almost. And then when they are reassessed, they again have to focus on what they can't do. There is nothing about what they can do or their strengths.

Glad I'm not the only one working in this field who is completely disillusioned. Most of my colleagues feel the same way though to be honest. You sum it up well. I have a client at the moment who was awarded enhanced rates whilst very unwell and refuses to report a change in circumstances now that she is a lot better, catching buses and walking much better, feeding tube no longer in etc. not that anyone gets re-assessed quickly even if they do report an improvement - it can take up to a year. the whole system is not fit for purpose.

I’m not surprised you became disillusioned!

Our nurse manager are required to work on wards alongside the nursing team. I’m not sure why you’re so unwilling to accept this. They are featured in our trust’s newsletter. It apparently allows insight into our working lives. .

Yes of course. Uc with LCWRA and PIP can be a similar figure than a full time nmw job.

So a very low income. Hard to survived on, especially with a disability or health issues because being ill or disabled is often expensive. Not to mention if they're private renting usually only able to get substandard "slumlord" properties on benefits, and if mortgaged I don't think there's any housing costs help for people on benefits?

And disability benefit money is obtained by what sounds like a very stressful and degrading process, of giving strangers (those who assess claims) detailed personal information. I understand too that this is a process repeated every few years for many people.

Also many people on full-time nmw jobs get extra UC money on top of their wages.

Whoever told you that does not know all about the mobility element then, I take it.

The mobility component of PIP for physical disability absolutely is based mainly on how far you can walk. You are assessed on the distance you can walk safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and within a reasonable time frame as per descriptors. It’s also possible to secure an award of PIP solely on mental health problems, or a mixture of the two, but this is subject to certain restrictions.

This is because PIP is based on the medical model, rather than the social model of disability. DLA was based on the social model and the questions were centred around what you would be able to do with an award of DLA and how that award would improve your life. You can thank the Tories for PIP - the medical model focuses on what the claimant can’t do and makes the benefit much harder to claim.

And the problem then becomes one of fraud if that person fails to report the change when they are formally reassessed.

That person is taking a foolish risk then. If she gets caught she'll be in trouble, and as she's seemingly being open about what she's doing, she's increasing the likelihood of getting caught.

Also isn't it the case that if you know a client is committing fraud you're obliged to report it? Otherwise aren't you kind of an accessory to the crime?

Separately, there's the flip side of benefit fraud, if looking at it from a purely economic point of view. For every person who possibly might be "playing the system", and I question how many really are (rather than genuinely having issues but feeling too ashamed to tell people), there's quite a lot of people who should be claiming who aren't.

These people struggle - financially and practically, but feel too scared or ashamed to apply. That's something that's known and has been noted in official figures/studies.