ESA award extended without assessment

My ESA50 was due to be "generated" on November 7 2015. Tired of anxiously awaiting the post, I rang the DWP. I have been informed that my support group award has been extended until January 2018. Delighted but suspicious, I have asked for this to be put in writing. The DWP staff member thought it was due to the backlog of cases. Has this happened to anyone else?

PT84Wilkinson wrote: My ESA50 was due to be "generated" on November 7 2015. Tired of anxiously awaiting the post, I rang the DWP. I have been informed that my support group award has been extended until January 2018. Delighted but suspicious, I have asked for this to be put in writing. The DWP staff member thought it was due to the backlog of cases. Has this happened to anyone else?

Hi PT84,

Yes, ESA reassessments have been getting deferred due to the backlog for some time now.

Lots of current ESA recipients, including our members have had their reassessments deferred.

See : This Post and the link to the associated topic therein.

bro58

Thank you for your reply. I now have the confirmation in writing! Has the DWP bothered being proactive and actually informing claimants?

The DWP may have said that they will start to call some people in for reassessments from the beginning of December, yet Maximus have just said they're having a lot of trouble recruiting enough assessors. How do these two stories square with each other? It sounds like a recipe for another meltdown in the system, unless the rate of reassessments for existing claimants is very gradual.

Thanks for that info Gordon…………I’ve been tossing a coin as to whether or not to commence preparation.

I had quietly been hoping like many others no doubt, that they might just still be deferring, looks like it’s time to go from neutral to overdrive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The pit of my stomach’s just hit the deck.

P.