called the DWP last Wednesday to ask about how long before we got a decision on PIP from first week of august!. very helpful lady (yes there are still some helpful people in there!) explained there was a backlog and that at the moment they were still dealing with AR1's/f2f's from July and were hoping that the first batch from August would be within the next four weeks.
Hope this news is helpful to others who are 'stuck' in the system
The following user(s) said Thank You: RJC, Gordon, Sick&Tired, housemouse93