Dla tribunal how long

She has night terrors and takes a long time to calm down. I explained the help she needs to have breakfast and what a battle it is sometimes to get her to eat anything. I tried to remember to explain why that was more than most nine year olds need. When I had, they asked me to go back to the waiting room. When they called me back in, they told me that they had given me high rate care and low rate mobility. We went out for pizza and a new toy to celebrate! If social distancing measures are in place as a result of the coronavirus, most of the advice below will still apply.

Before the hearing, sit down with your friend and write a list of all the help their child needs. Take it with you on the day and tick them off as they are said. If at the end of the hearing there are still things that haven't been said - you can remind them. Try not to answer questions on your friend's behalf. If you realise that your friend has left bits out when answering a question - try to remind them, rather than say it for them.

However, if they are finding it difficult or becoming very emotional you can answer the question yourself although it is best to ask the Tribunal Judge if it is OK first, just to be polite. If they get upset or stressed you can try to calm them down. If this doesn't work, ask them if they want a short break.

Read through this guide particularly the sections about the hearing and what to do on the day. This will help you to know what will happen so that you can help your friend. If you were successful, the DWP will work out how much they owe you. You will start receiving the new amount every month, and a sum covering the amount they should have been paying you all along.

You will usually receive your money in about 4 - 6 weeks. If you already receive Universal Credit, the amount you recieve may go up as you will now be entitled to the disabled child element. For some parents, these additional benefits are worth more than the DLA. Check if you are entitled to any extra benefits now by speaking to an adviser see How to find an adviser or by using the benefits calculator on the Turn2Us website. If you weren't successful, you will be sent a leaflet to explain your options.

Sometimes you might be able to appeal to the Upper Tribunal. This is like a higher court. However, this can only be done if the panel did something wrong with the law. It is very complicated, and very few people can do this without an experienced adviser. The DWP also has the right to appeal to the Upper Tribunal if they think the tribunal panel did something wrong.

This rarely happens. If it does happen, they will write and tell you. This is a benefit expert who can give you advice about your claim. They may also be able to help you prepare for the hearing.

If you are lucky, you may be able to find an adviser to be your representative at the hearing see below. This means a panel of three experts who do not work for the DWP will look at your claim and see if the right decision was made. If they think the wrong decision was made, they will change it. This can be physical help such as spoon-feeding a child or doing buttons up if they are old enough for other children of the same age to be able to do this without help.

Or it can be non-physical help such as prompting a child though the stages of getting dressed, or encouraging a child to eat or stay focussed. This is anything to do with the body and how it works, for example eating, drinking, washing, dressing, going to the toilet, sleeping, thinking and communicating.

This is the person who organises the hearing and deals with the paper work. This means anything that you reasonably need to do every day or most days. This includes things like eating, washing, dressing, taking medication, sleeping and so on, and also learning, communicating, and having fun.

We have used this phrase because we think it is more easily understood. This is the government department that deals with most benefits, including Disability Living Allowance. This is the name for the panel of three experts who do not work for the DWP who will hear your appeal to see if the DWP made the right decision. This is when your appeal is looked at by the Tribunal. We strongly advise you to go to a hearing in person.

You have a much better chance of success if you do. This means the DWP will look at their decision again. You must ask for a mandatory reconsideration before you can appeal a decision. See How to ask the DWP to look at their decision again. You will have received two copies. You must include a copy of the mandatory reconsideration decision notice with your appeal form. During the coronavirus crisis, some cases may be looked at by a judge who, on the basis of the papers alone, thinks that you are entitled to a higher amount.

Both the claimant and the DWP will be asked if they accept the preliminary view. This is an expert in benefits who might help you prepare for the hearing and may be able to come with you to help you put your case. At the time of writing, this is the form you use to ask for an appeal. See How to ask for an appeal for advice on how to fill it in. This means where the child needs someone with them to avoid substantial danger. This could be because the child might need to be physically restrained to stop something from happening for example, running into a road or where they need to be watched in case something happens for example, a seizure and they need help afterwards.

All children need some degree of supervision, so to entitle a child to DLA the child must need a lot more supervision than other children their age. This is the person that sits in the middle of the panel who will make a decision on your case. They are legally qualified.

If you weren't successful in your appeal, you might be able to appeal to the Upper Tribunal, but you can only do this if the panel made a mistake with the law. You can find both the latest form to use and the online system when that is launched on GOV.

You can find details about appeal venues and how to get to them, how to reclaim expenses, and information about the appeal process on GOV. Contact is a charity working with and for families with disabled children. They have some really useful information about claiming DLA for children and how to cope with the trickiest bits of the form which may help with your appeal.

They can also help with other problems you might have with DLA. This page is written for doctors, social workers, support workers, paid carers, teachers, occupational therapists, and other professionals who might be able to tell the appeal panel what they need to know.

It explains how to write helpful evidence for this kind of benefit appeal. Evidence from doctors and other professionals helps the tribunal to come to the right decision more than anything else. Your evidence doesn't need to be long or typed, but it would be most useful if it included everything you are aware the child concerned needs help with.

Whether a child is entitled to DLA is decided by how much help they need. They may not get this help, many people 'manage', but these benefits are based on help they should have in an ideal world. If you are a medical professional, start by confirming any diagnosis and any treatment that they receive. Then you need to go into the detail. If they cannot walk even short distances without discomfort, or if they are very slow, please say so.

If they need help to walk around school for example, please explain what difficulty they have and what help they need. Equally, if they need more help than another child their age to go further afield to places that are unfamiliar, please say that.

This might be help to stay safe or encouragement, prompting or soothing. Next, look at the help they need in the home or at school.

As far as you know, do they need extra physical help, prompting, or encouragement to:. If they can do any of these things on their own but it takes them a very long time, causes them pain, or may put them or somebody else in danger the law sees this as needing help.

Do they need help overnight, to stay in bed, go to the toilet, calm down if they get distressed, etc? If you are aware that they often have difficulty sleeping it will be useful to say that. If you are aware that they have been hurt, or could have been hurt, as a result of their condition, you should say so. Perhaps they have fallen, had violent seizures, or self-harmed. If you are aware of a time when they have hurt or posed a danger to somebody else, it would be most useful to include this.

Lastly, does their condition fluctuate? If it is bad on some days but better on others, it would be useful to make that clear. On the left is information to help you write your statement to the panel. It tells you all the things you should try to put in your statement and how to begin. I am writing to you to explain my reason for appealing the decision to award my son Alfie Nowak only the lower rate of care of DLA. Tell them what rate you think your child should be entitled to.

Go to page x for more information about the different rates. I am appealing the decision as I believe that Alfie is entitled to the high rate of care and low rate of mobility. Alfie gets very distressed and finds it impossible to follow rules. He is sometimes violent and destructive. He can be so impulsive that he can put himself and others in danger.

If your child has physical difficulty walking, it is most useful to talk about distances in terms that mean something to you. Alfie can get very angry about going places, for example, going to school.

It is only a 5 minute walk but it is a huge battle every day. In order to get him to go and to keep moving without difficulty I have to soothe and calm him constantly. I hold his hand because this helps keep him calm and means I can restrain him if he starts to get angry or panic.

When he gets angry or panics he will impulsively run away, including into the road. Alfie also panics at the sound of unexpected noises - dogs barking, a loud motorbike, a scream or siren. By contrast, most of his peers now walk to and from school on their own.

Alfie often feels overwhelmed and needs prompting, encouragement and soothing to get up, get dressed, eat his breakfast and get washed and ready for school.

He will often refuse to go upstairs and brush his teeth, for example, unless I go with him. This is because he is scared to be on his own. He also needs supervision - without it most days he would either eat far too much or get distracted and eat nothing at all.

Without supervision he would not wash his face or brush his teeth or hair either. Alfie is scared of baths and showers and will avoid them at all costs. He has a bath and a hair wash twice a week and we have to go through a whole rigmarole of calming and encouraging and soothing to make that happen. Even then, sometimes he will get aggressive and cross about it and physically prevent it from happening. When we get to school Alfie often refuses to go in. He needs help from both me and his support worker to calm down and get into the classroom without running away or hurting anybody.

At school he needs extra help and supervision to keep him engaged, soothed, and prevent him from getting excited and destructive or violent. He needs extra help to learn and to communicate confidently with his peers and teachers. Alfie particularly struggles with transitions - for example when one activity ends and another begins.

He needs extra help from his TA to cope with this and keep calm, and he is escorted round the school at these times. Similarly he finds the beginning and ending of school very hard and needs a lot of support from both me and his TA. Alfie finds it hard to go to sleep and wakes frequently.

He requires a lot of reassurance and soothing to go to sleep and I am often still doing this at midnight. If he wakes in the night, he panics and anything can happen. Tell them if your child has ever been hurt or might have been hurt , because of their illness or condition. Alfie can act impulsively and make poor decisions that put him in danger. He can and has ran into the road when he was angry, he has climbed on to the school roof and attempted to jump off, and he has climbed over the fence and tried to run away.

He needs to be supervised at all times so that he can be restrained if necessary. He can also be very verbally aggressive to others and shout and threaten them.

He has only very rarely actually hurt anyone but it has happened. Alfie is a keen swimmer and is very good at it, but I cannot take him swimming as I have hurt my leg. If not getting the help you need causes other problems, it is very useful to say so. If he could have help from other people to engage in swimming and other activities this would improve. It is important that they understand how often you need help.

So try to make sure you have said how often each thing happens. Getting him to take his medication can take 2 minutes or it can take Calming him and getting him to his therapy appointment takes 60 minutes to get there, 30 minutes back. If you disagree with anything in the papers they sent you, you need to tell them what was wrong and why this isn't right. When you have finished writing the statement, read it back through more than once.

Does it say everything you want it to say? The cases we refer to are not always real but show a typical situation. We have included them to help you think about how to deal with your own situation. Share on Facebook. Share on Twitter. Share on LinkedIn. Written by Advicenow. What is this search? Boost your knowledge, confidence and skills How to win a DLA appeal.

We want to help you get what you are entitled to. This guide will help you work out if you should challenge the decision, as well as show you how to do it and win. How to win a DLA appeal. Download If you made a claim for DLA for a child and you didn't get the award that you think they were entitled to, you don't have to give up. This guide will help you work out if you should challenge the decision by asking the DWP to look at their decision again.

If you decide you should challenge it, this guide will show you what to do step-by-step. What countries does this guide cover?

Can you spare a few minutes? If they say they are too busy…. To get the higher rate for care, your child must need substantially more practical help, encouragement or prompting with daily living tasks than another child of their age frequently throughout the day, and for either at least 20 minutes at night or at least three times, or someone to keep an eye on them during the day and night to make sure they do not hurt themselves or other people. To get the middle rate for care, they must need substantially more practical help, encouragement or prompting with daily living tasks than another child of their age frequently throughout the day, o r substantially more help than other children their age for at least 20 minutes at night, or at least three times during the night, o r someone with them most of the time during the day to help them stay safe, or someone awake and checking on them at night to help them stay safe.

To get the lower rate for care they must need substantially more practical help, encouragement or prompting than other children of their age for at least one hour or more in one go or spread throughout the day. To get the high rate for mobility your child must:. Bad day myth Lots of people believe that you should describe the help your child needs on their worst days as if they need this level of help every day.

Please tell us how it goes We want to find out more about the impact of our DLA mandatory reconsideration request tool and appeal guide.

If social distancing measures are still in place You are likely to be offered a telephone or video hearing rather than to go to a face-to-face hearing. If the DWP call you The DWP have been ringing some people at this stage or before the hearing and offering them an award in return for dropping their appeal.

Support groups Online and other support groups can sometimes be very helpful. Before you ask anybody for evidence — read this! Paying for medical evidence GP's and other medical professionals are allowed to charge for evidence. Back Support Us In this section you will find information on how you can get involved with supporting Turn2us and the work we do.

Back Working With Us In this section you will find information aimed at charity fund providers and those working with people in financial need. Back About Us Turn2us helps people in financial need gain access to welfare benefits, charitable grants and other financial help — online, by phone and face to face through our partner organisations.

Can my child get DLA? How do I challenge a DLA decision? Further information on Challenges and complaints Updated February What you were doing? What would you like to report? Security code. Other special needs chat Carers allowance. How long? I waited 18 months!! Can't find your answer? Hi Michelle, I'm sorry to read your application for DLA has been declined and your having to wait to get an appointment with the tribunal service. You've had some good responses from mums who have been where you are right now.

Yes do go to the tribunal yourself - as the panel may wish to ask further questions and that's your chance to further influence their decision and give them the information they require. It is a long process, but hopefully the outcome will be in your best interests Good luck Rifat.

In answer to hazel s Hazel when you state "no wonder we are in this mess" as your heading what mess do you mean? Are you referring to the governments welfare reforms or the fact that families like mine are waiting so long for financial help?

Kiera shared her experience with me and offered me advice for which I am grateful, you are not offering me any help at all with this comment. If you read Kiera's comment again you will see that she did NOT write "don't tell them too much information" but to "give them too much information and only write about the bad days" this is the same advice that numerous children's charities give as well.

This is not about making fraudulent benefit claims but as you may not know children with special needs have fluctuating needs and rightly or wrongly claims ARE based or what they can't do.

You don't know anything about my daughters needs, we have spent 11 days at hospital this year alone, for which I have had to find childcare for my other daughter and take time off work, I am self employed so don't get paid for days I don't work. I do not appreciate your suggestion that I might commit fraud, please do not comment on my thread again, I am looking for advice only from other supportive mothers.

Other special needs chat referral to paediatrician - how long? Other special needs chat Dla decision maker. How long.