CPIP/387/2017 Precaution against incontinence to claim points under PIP Descriptor 5.
The Upper Tribunal has recently made a decision (CPIP/387/2017) which will help people who use pads as a precaution against incontinence to claim points under PIP Descriptor 5.
BACKGROUND PIP Descriptor 5 (b) says that people who use an aid to help them with their continence or toilet needs can claim 2 points. The Upper Tribunal has already confirmed that an incontinence pad is an aid for the purposes of PIP. However, many people who have incontinence wear pads just in case or as a precaution, even if they are not incontinent all the time. The DWP argued that *precautionary* use of pads when there was no incontinence didn’t count for PIP. The Upper Tribunal had to decide whether DWP were right.
WHAT THE UPPER TRIBUNAL DECIDED The Upper Tribunal decided that the DWP were wrong. They decided that people who wear pads more than half the time as a precaution against incontinence do qualify as using an aid for PIP purposes even if they are not actually incontinent half the time. However, the Upper Tribunal did also say that using pads had to be ‘reasonably required’, which means that the person does have to have been diagnosed with incontinence and suffer leakage or loss of control which could cause soiling.
WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOU If you have been diagnosed with incontinence and suffer leakage or loss of control which could cause soiling, and wear pads more than half the time as a reasonable precaution against soiling, then this counts as using an aid for toileting purposes for PIP Descriptor 5(b), earning 2 points. This applies even if you don’t have incontinence or soiling more than half the time.
TIMING The Upper Tribunal made this decision on 4 June 2017 but it’s a clarification of the law rather than a new definition. This means that you can use this decision to help you straightaway n your claims, mandatory reconsiderations and appeals, even for cases which were decided before 4 June. It may take some months before DWP and assessors catch up with this decision, however.
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You can read the full judgement here: https://www.gov.uk/administrative-appeals-tribunal-decisions/secretary-of-state-for-work-and-pensions-v-nh-pip-2017-ukut-258-aac
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