Hard of hearing..can i apply for pip?

Hello Ashna and welcome to the forum.

PiP is awarded not because of your condition but on how your condition impacts your daily living and mobility and the help you NEED (which is not necessarily the help you get) with these activities.

In the early days of mask wearing I witnessed the confusion caused in a local store when someone who was dependent upon lip reading to communicate was attempting to ask a question at customer services, so your statement about difficult it is immediately registered, and I feel your frustration.

We have lots of guides about guides about claiming PiP

www.benefitsandwork.co.uk/help-for-claimants/pip

These will show you what you can be awarded points for and have tips on how to present your case. I would suggest that you make use of the diaries to record evidence of the difficulties you have.

On the matter of telephone assessments the simple answer is that it is up to the DWP to find a way that works for you. If you submit your claim now any award will be back dated to when you applied, not to when they find a way to assess you. They do sometimes carry out a paper assessment, I.e. they just consider what you put in your form, it is possible to nominate someone who knows you and the difficulties you experience to speak on your behalf, and I can see no reason why a hearing person could not act as your interpreter.

I would also suggest that you contact charities which particularly support people with hearing difficulties, it is possible that they have a pool of experience you can tap into.

I will see if I can find any information which might be specifically helpful to someone with hearing difficulties, but it might take a few days and I am promising nothing.

Hope that helps a little
Catherine

Well Ashna,

It is worth doing a little research! I just looked up case law about lip reading, and for a person who is dependent upon lip reading they cannot be considered to be able to reliably communicate verbally. When you read the guides you will see that there is a whole activity which is about communicating verbally.

There is also another case where it was decided that because someone had to remove their hearing aids whilst having a bath / shower it reasonable to say that they needed supervision since they could not hear an alarm.

pipinfo.net/conditions/hearing-impairment

I am confident that is of help to you, and I would encourage you to apply.

Catherine