Advice Please

Hi Specialone,

Well done for the 10 year award!
You were awarded 8 points under Daily Living in order to get an Enhanced award you would need a further 4 points, but possibly more if you were already granted some points for managing toilet needs as the lower points would be lost, and then you gain all the higher score- I hope this makes sense.

This means that you are relying solely on points under descriptor 5 you will need to get points from 5d e or f.
d.Needs assistance to be able to manage toilet needs. 4 points

e.Needs assistance to be able to manage incontinence of either bladder or bowel. 6 points

f.Needs assistance to be able to manage incontinence of both bladder and bowel. 8 points

I have copied the descriptors. For your reference. As you can see, for each of these descriptors you need to prove assistance is required eg you need help sitting down or getting up off the toilet for or can not clean yourself properly.
Unfortunately you can not score points simply because you have incontinence, even if you need the toilet many times during the day or night.
Descriptors can be scored if the problem occurs for the majority of days. If I understand your post correctly you have incontinence 3 or 4 times per week. It is unclear if you mean 3 or 4 days or it could happen 3 times which could be eg all in one day. There is clearly a difference. 3 separate a week will not be the majority, but 4 could be.(Assuming that you need the sort of assistance described above.) 3 times over 1 day, isn't the majority of days.

However, you need to be able to manage your toilet needs ( as with all descriptors) to an acceptable standard, repeatedly across the whole day, within a reasonable time and safely. If you fail to be able to do all 4 of these, then this indicates a need for assistance. Repetition criteria means that you need to do the activity safely, timely and acceptably over the whole day, so each visit to the toilet has to meet the other criteria, if it doesn't then again this fails the repeatedly criteria.

Unless you are confident of achieving at least 4 points, then you will not gain Enhanced rate, even if the Assessor/Decision Maker completely ignored what you said in respect of toilet needs, because it will not make any difference to the points value.
If the 4 points or more are possible on toilet needs or another descriptor, then your MR has the potential to change your award so it could be worth while doing this. To recap, MR will not ever succeed however poor the assessor is, if your disabilities still can't gain 12+ points!

If you can achieve more points, and wish to do MR it ispossibke that the current award is reviewed, but this is highly unlikely. (And you could appeal this decision anyway, by going to the tribunal.) You should make it clear that you are only appealing a limited area, and you agree with the other points, but just not descriptor 5. Since it is unlikely you will get a review, it is also unlikely you will be required to attend a further assessment.

The members guides provide more information if you need further help.

I hope this helps.
LL26