Total confusion: ESA/Severe Disability Premium/DWP error in 2023

I have been in receipt of ESA since 2015, and reach state retirement age on 29 September this year. The DWP have been hassling me endlessly all year after they discovered that, due to their error in September 2023, they’ve not been counting my husband's state retirement pension as income, but have been counting his Carers Allowance, which was stopped when we started receiving State Pension, and so have messed up my entitlement.

I'm still fighting with them for the backdated Severe Disability Premium they tell me I’ve been entitled to since September 2023, and for which I was sent a form early this year to complete for my claim. At least 4 different DWP telephone staff have assured me I am due and will receive this benefit, with a backdated payment of around £7000. However, during an unexpected telephone call from DWP some months ago I was told that the backdated Premium due has now been used to offset most of the overpayment, and they are also taking money off me weekly to pay back the balance they insist I still owe them.

A friend whose partner is a former DWP employee sent me actual DWP information that states any claw back due to DWP error can only be made on New Style ESA, but mine is the original ESA (claim dates apply). Speaking recently to another DWP rep who rang me, she confirmed that DWP's ability to claw back overpayment depends on the date of my ESA claim start, and acknowledged that my ESA is the original ESA not New Style, and that New Style ESA didn't come into force until over 12 months following the success of my claim.

I‘ve received numerous letters from DWP this year about my entitlement, and as always they are difficult to understand and usually incorrect. I've even received two letters printed and sent a day apart giving wildly different amounts of entitlement. The whole situation is exhausting to deal with. My husband having to go back to work in order for us to survive financially (he is 68 and disabled) for 15 hours/week has complicated matters and despite us keeping DWP informed at every step they are still making a total hash of my ESA entitlement.

In April I received no ESA payments at all; this was apparently due to DWP working out what they referred to as a 'substantial sum' due to be issued to me for backdated Severe Disability Premium. Quite why they felt that it was OK to withhold my ESA entirely while they did their sums over that premium is something I can't understand. The situation cased me huge distress and anxiety not to mention problems making regular bill payments, including rent. Not only that, but DWP incorrectly informed my local council that my ESA claim had ended, so the council stopped my Housing Benefit. The council wrote to me about this but the DWP didn't bother. Thankfully, after speaking to a very sympathetic Council rep, she made what she called a 'manual check' and told me that she could see that my ESA claim had not ended, so my HB was reinstated, though of course delayed.

Three letters of complaint sent to DWP this year remain unacknowledged and unanswered. Yesterday, with 8 weeks to go before I reach state pension age when my ESA will cease anyway, I received a letter from Health Assessment Advisory Service (HAAS) to undergo a telephone Work Capability assessment on 19th August. This makes absolutely zero sense and will be a waste of everyone's time. The letter states that I must take the call, no alternative dates were offered. It's state bullying IMO, and I'm simply not up to taking the call, but I don't know what I can do about it. This afternoon I rang HAAS and spoke to a woman who seemed very sympathetic. She urged me to go ahead with the assessment, and said that if it was found that I have limited capability for work (which I already have according to my current claim) I would be due backdated payments from March 2023. I had to tell her that my claim began in 2016, and I was sure I wasn’t owed any money in that respect, but she still urged me to complete the assessment, so I don’t know what’s going on and what significance March 2023 has.

Regarding the 2023 DWP error resulting in overpayment, I'm simply hitting a brick wall as DWP don't listen to anything I say and are now refusing to accept that I am owed anything anyway, despite other telephone staff telling me earlier in the that DWP can't claw back the Severe Disability Premium I'm owed in order to cover their overpayment error. A particularly odious member of the DWP staff, who has rung me twice this year without any warning (which always stresses me out) told me when I challenged him that DWP is not clawing back the SDP due to me to cover their error, they have simply 'adjusted' the figures!

I'm concerned that once my ESA claim ends DWP will refuse to even consider repaying the money they owe me, and can no longer cope with this on my own. Any advice or suggestions on any or all of the above would be most welcome.