providing further evidence for appeal

Chunkie

There are two phases to an appeal, first the DWP will carry out a Reconsideration of the original Decision, if this fails then your papers will be forwarded to the Tribunal Service for an Appeal.

Reconsiderations are taking anywhere from a couple of months to 5 or 6 months in the extreme, the average is about 3-4 months. Tribunals are typically taking 6-9 months from when the Tribunal Service receive the documentation.

You can submit evidence to both of the processes. I would aim to have anything you want to be considered as part of the Reconsideration within 4 weeks of lodging your appeal and at worst 6 weeks, there may be time after this to submit evidence, but it cannot be guaranteed.

If you are passed to the Tribunal Service then you should aim to send your evidence within one month of your receiving the papers, although in practice you can usually continue to send information up to about 2 weeks before the hearing.

With regard the DWP contacting your GP, they are not obliged to do so, and in the majority of cases will not, having made a Decision on your claim they will not not now contact your doctor for any information, so if you need them to comment on your condition(s) then you are going to need to pursuade them to do so.

You can access your medical records, see

Requesting your medical records

Charging for medical records

If you have further questions, please come back to the forum.

Gordon