DWP misled me into thinking I was getting SDP payments

Hi there,

I was wondering if anyone had any experiences like this - sorry if you've already posted, I did look but I couldn't find anything that seemed to apply directly to my situation.

I've been entitled to SDP due to getting PIP and income-related ESA since July 2020, and I falsely believed I was getting it because my ESA total weekly rate was always higher than the maximum listed on the government website, the difference which looked like a rough match to the SDP rate. In Feb, when I was using Citizens Advice to make my migration to UC from income-related ESA, they notified me that I had never been paid SDP and that I needed to contact ESA as fast as possible to get them to correct it to prevent any additional losses to my UC transitional payment.

I then discovered the CHANGES TO SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS notification letter I had received the week before was actually a hidden reassessment with a new award secretly hidden on page 3, tucked under 2 pages of generic unrelated information. I then realised that every single item on the breakdown didn't match anything on the website, and any element the DWP decided you aren't entitled to they just omitted from the breakdown entirely, making it impossible to know for sure what you've got and why and if anything important was missing. I also learnt that the maximum the ESA government website reports is less than half the maximum some claimants can get, which is blatant fraud by misrepresentation as they say you will get "up to" this amount or in other words, the maximum.

I sent a tracked and signed for letter on 28th February for a mandatory reconsideration to that new hidden ESA award in that letter as well as a formal fraud complaint for the rest my claim, demanding I have full backpay due to this fraudulent error caused by the DWP actively misleading me and negligently denying me that SDP element for nearly 5 years.

To date, I have received no word from the DWP other than to arrange an illegal visit to my home to force me to migrate to UC tomorrow and I am coming up to my deadline to switch to UC and CAB have told me not to let it lapse no matter what happens with the ESA complaint.

I wanted to know if anyone else had experience raising this kind of complaint with the DWP and suing them if they refuse to repay me what they owe? I know that the staff are legally and financially exposed as well the DWP, but I don't actually know how easy or what order to do things in and was hoping for some insight. Thanks!