UC review as Appointee for severely disabled young adult DD - proof of address and bank statements?

[BuffetedByRoughSeas]

I'm the Appointee with DWP for my very severely disabled young adult DD. She is entitled to UC with LCWWRA and Housing element (UC pays half the rent), as well as PIP. Her disabilities include very severe Learning Disabilities. She has no understanding at all of financial matters and so I have to receive and administer her benefits on her behalf. She has high and complex needs requiring 24/7 care and I provide that.

Her UC is being reviewed yet again. Every time this is a lengthy, frustrating, confusing and time-consuming process of many weeks. I have uploaded a formal letter from the landlord which gives proof of the long-term private tenancy with her named as joint tenant, address, rent, frequency and that payments are up to date. This time they are asking for further proof that she lives here in the form of a Council Tax or utility bill or tax letter from HMRC. I have explained that there is nothing like that in her name as everything is in my name. They are now asking for 'something else' to prove she lives here. What can I do in these circumstances?

Secondly they had asked for her bank statements for the last 4 months. When previously I have explained that she does not have any accounts they have accepted that and not required me to provide anything. This time they are asking for the last 4 months of my bank statements instead to show her UC going in. I can't understand why they need my bank statements for this when they already have the details of where the UC is being paid in to in their own records? Do I have to provide my own private bank statements? To be clear I support myself and don't receive any benefits at all apart from Carers Allowance. They have said I can redact them as they are my statements rather than hers. I'm not looking forward to trying to redact, save and upload umpteen pages of my statements. My privacy is very important to me and I am entitled to it, so if I do provide them what is the best way to redact them? If I overwrite my online bank statement entries with black (except DD's UC deposits and I thought the rent payments to the landlord would be a good idea) and then save them again to upload to the UC account, is that right/safe? I'm not very tech-savvy at all and seem to remember reading somewhere that the black could be removed by AI or the screen lightened to make the information readable again?

Please be kind and clear. Life is exhausting and highly stressful. It would be helpful to know if you are giving your opinion or if your advice comes from personal, professional or volunteering experience. Many thanks in advance.

For a reliable way to create a PDF from a screenshot file, go to the Print dialogue as if to print the screenshot file.

Somewhere you will usually see an option mentioning "PDF", or "Save as PDF". Follow that, and you should end up with a PDF saved to your computer / phone.

(IIUC what's happening is it "prints" the file into a PDF file on your computer, rather than sending the file to a printer. Anyway, it's a highly reliable commonly available way to get a PDF from any kind of document or pic.)

I'm an appointee for my disabled adult ds and I've found it easiest to run things on his behalf as if he is a regular adult. He has LCWRA and UC and gets PIP all paid into an account in his name, but I do all the admin for it as I have the login details and debit card. He has a passport and provisional driver's licence too although he never goes abroad and won't ever drive. But really useful for ID etc. He is also on the bills for electric/gas, water and council tax. I figure it might be handy if it's needed for proof of address etc. We're fortunate that we've never had a UC review (he's been on it for a decade). But we've had a few situations where we've needed to submit documents and he has all the documents a normal adult would have. These days everything is run online so he doesn't have to deal with the admin himself.

Even if you don't want to open up account for your dd, you should open a separate one for yourself for her benefits. It can be done in a few minutes online, most banks won't need you to go in branch. It's useful for separating her finances and yours.

To get nhs letters to submit online:
Take photo on phone
email to laptop from phone
open picture on laptop
print to pdf

Libraries also tend to have scanners and friendly staff.

(it’s bonkers it’s this much faff - but am assuming you need a solution too).

Also, daft Q, but does your laptop have a camera?

I'm also not a smartphone user, and it took me an embarrassing amount of time (and a bit of prodding round the Help menu) to realise I could take photos of documents with the laptop.

Op leave them a message saying that you can't upload documents and need a job centre appointment to provide printed statements, maybe? Then you can use a Sharpie to redact info. I'm almost certain they have to allow this.

Just to update, with help from pps on the thread I eventually managed to redact, screenshot and upload my online bank statements and a proof of address using DD's medical records. It's another anxious wait for the telephone appointment to see if that's ok or if they want anything further or have any questions. It seems unnecessary and heavy-handed to keep reviewing DD's UC given the situation. Thank you for all the support and advice. I really appreciate it. Although with such limited free time I haven't had chance to reply to everyone individually, I have read every post.

Oh well done.

Best of luck for the rest of the grim process.