ATOS face to face medical

Diddybambi

Unless you can show that there is something fundamentally wrong with the report, for example the assessor failed to notice that you had one leg (it has happened ) then it's unlikely that the assessor will take any notice of the issues you might raise before they make the Decision, however, this should not prevent you from commenting on the report.

PIP Decisions are currently taking 2-4 weeks so you only have a narrow window.

If the award is less than you hoped for then the first stage to challenging a Decision is for you to request a Mandatory Reconsideration, this needs to be done in writing to the DWP, within one month of the Decision, to the office that dealt with your claim, have a look at our PIP MR & Appeal guide for details of the process, the PIP area also has template letters that you can use to make the request with.

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

You should contact the DWP for a copy of the assessment report if you have not already done so, I would phone them but again follow up the request in writing. Once you have the assessment report you will have a better understanding of how the DWP Decision Maker has come to their conclusions and will then be able to argue against them.

Your primary task is to show that you meet the criteria, there are many reasons you may have failed, you need to address each of these but don't get bogged down in criticising the assessment report unless you can clearly show that it is incorrect, it is a lot easier to argue the facts of the situation;

"the assessor recorded that I walked 50m, I did but they have failed to document that I had to stop every 10m for a rest due to breathlessness"

than their opinions

"based on my observations of the claimant walking I believe that they can reliably walk more than 200m.

When you have a better idea of the issues with your claim, come back to the forum and we will do our best to help.

Gordon

Diddybambi

Ignore the paragraph about requesting the assessment report, I should have deleted it before posting.

Even though the assessor was under training you cannot assume that they were not capable of carrying out the assessment, it may of been the case but you must show it by specific reference to the assessors opinions in the report.

I'm afraid I don't think there is any mileage in raising the issue of being asked if you were happy about the trainee assessor with the DWP, although it might be a matter to raise with the Assessment Provider as part of a complaint.

Gordon