DLA supercession - lost my mobility allowance

Many Upper Tribunal Judges (formerly Social Security Commissioners), deprecate the use of IB/ESA medical reports to decide DLA claims.

Indeed, I have a Commissioner's decision pertinent to a DLA appeal where the Commissioner (as he was then), indicated that an IB medical report was of no value or consequence to support a DLA claim/appeal.

Accordingly, if a claimant can't cross-refer medical reports, then the DWP shouldn't be allowed to do likewise.

I beleive that physical examination findings at a properly conducted ESA medical could be legitimately used to
review a DLA award (either way...positively or negatively)
Also the customer's disclosures made to the ESA examiner might be contradictions of content in a DLA form

Even though that (or other Commissioners) might have reservations
about IB/ESA evidence being used for DLA it is vital to be aware of the possibility, hence the DLA Alerts, in the ESA guides on this website as an example
.

It would be interesting to read any of these decisions, have you a reference ?

I beleive that the DWP should have to put a declaration of this possibility of the DLA unit using the content or later clinical findings on IB/ESA forms

It seems most unfair that it isnt made clear.

XFACTOR wrote:

I beleive that physical examination findings at a properly conducted ESA medical could be legitimately used to
review a DLA award (either way...positively or negatively)
Also the customer's disclosures made to the ESA examiner might be contradictions of content in a DLA form

Even though that (or other Commissioners) might have reservations
about IB/ESA evidence being used for DLA it is vital to be aware of the possibility, hence the DLA Alerts, in the ESA guides on this website as an example.

It would be interesting to read any of these decisions, have you a reference ?

I beleive that the DWP should have to put a declaration of this possibility of the DLA unit using the content or later clinical findings on IB/ESA forms

It seems most unfair that it isnt made clear.

The question that arises in the OP's case, is that the DLA Unit relied upon an ESA medical report compiled some ten months before the date of the DLA decision. Anything could have happened with level of mobility in that time. Where do you draw the line with the time lapse on these medical reports ie one year, two years of even five years?

The decision to cross-refer a medical report for one benefit to decide another, has only came into being with the introduction of ESA. I had never come across any cases where IB medical reports were routinely used to decided DLA claims certainly at the SS Commissioner/UT level. So it begs the question what has changed?

Unfortunately, I don't have any references of SS Commissioner/UT decisions to hand on this subject matter, other than a Commissioner's Decision in my own case which cannot be uploaded to this forum.

IB reports were used to review DLA In fact deep within training manuals this can be seen . It may not have happened all that often.

If the OP has not had any medical examination between the ESA one and the decision to end the award of mobility then the ESA medical report is potentially significant if by reference to clinical findings including distance and discomfort,it is compatible with ending a DLA award.

However, whilst some months have elapsed between the ESA decision and the ending of the DLA award it may well be less dependable as evidence. The original OP has not given us any details about the length of the original mobility award, or the condition causing it and we do not know what the relevant section of the ESA report says, that has apparently been relied on. For example, at the ESA examination it may have been a 'good day' which has been distorted into a dependable finding

But I can confirm that IB reports have been used to undermine DLA decisions, and also that on some occasions it has worked the other way arouund, a claimant has successfully used a PCA medical report to establish DLA

I do not beleive the reports were routinely used but the facility exists and it did happen.