Managed migration of employment and support allowance (ESA) claimants to universal credit (UC) has now begun, according to the government’s official “Move to universal credit” website.
Until yesterday, the website’s timetable for managed migration listed the date for “Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) only” and “Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) with Housing Benefit”, migration as being "From Autumn 2024 (TBC)".
However, the timetable now says that people receiving these benefits may get their migration letter “From September 2024”.
Whilst there has been no other official confirmation, the change to the website does appear to be definitive.
You can see the timetable on the “When you need to apply for Universal Credit” web page.
As we highlighted earlier this month, there have been growing signs that the DWP was preparing to start managed migration for income-related ESA (irESA) claimants, including evidence to the Public Accounts Committee and updates in the Touchbase newsletter.
The move is going ahead in spite of fears raised by organisations such as Citizens Advice that irESA claimants are a “potentially highly vulnerable group” and that it is essential that better safeguards are put in place before migration begins.
Here at Benefits and Work, we have a 28 page members guide to ESA to UC migration.
And, as a result of the many issues raised by visitors to the site, we have now supplemented this with an 11 page collection of answers to FAQs for members, which we hope covers most of the main concerns that have been raised.
We will be publishing more information and resources over the coming weeks.
Members can download our managed migration resources from the ESA and UC guides page.
