PIP alert over extra £150 payments from the DWP | Personal Finance | Finance

PIP claimants (Personal Independence Payment) are being encouraged to check if they could get more payments from the DWP. Now is a good time to check as payment rates have just increased with the April increase to benefits.

Benefits experts fear that some people may be missing out on the benefit altogether despite being eligible, while others could get a higher payment rate. PIP exists to help cover the extra costs you incur in living with a long-term health condition or disability.

The payments are not means-tested so your entitlement is not affected by your income or employment situation. There are different levels of payment depending on the degree to which your condition affects you.

So if you are already on the benefit and your condition worsens, you could get more. Rebecca Lamb, external relations manager at finances support group Money Wellness, warned the current claimants could be missing out on more cash through the scheme.

She said: “A common issue is people being awarded a lower rate of PIP than they may be entitled to, simply because they don’t fully explain the day-to-day impact of their condition. PIP assessments focus on how your condition affects you in practice, not just your diagnosis.

“So if people only describe their condition medically, or downplay their difficulties, they can miss out on higher awards. We often see people who are used to ‘coping’ understate their struggles, but that can mean missing out on significant financial support – in some cases more than £4,000 a year between standard and enhanced rates.”

The benefit includes a daily living element and a mobility element, with a higher and lower rate for each depending on to what extent your condition impacts you. You can get nothing for one part while getting either amount for the other.

How much is PIP?

Payments increased 3.8 percent in April in line with inflation. These are the current weekly payment rates:

• Lower – £76.70 a week
• Higher – £114.60 a week

Mobility part

• Lower – £30.30 a week
• Higher – £80 a week.

Payment increase

This means that if you were on the lower rate for the daily living part and were bumped up to the higher rate, you would get an extra £37.90 a week, or £151.60 each four-week pay period. This is the equivalent of an extra £1,970.80 a year.

The potential gains are even bigger if you moved up from the lower rate for the mobility part to the enhanced rate. In this case, you would get an extra £49.70 a week, or £198.80 in your four-week pay packet. This is worth an extra £2,584.40 a year.

Ms Lamb said another danger is that people who have a health condition that varies in how it impacts them could also miss out on what they are due. She said: “We often see people with conditions like chronic pain, mobility issues, heart or lung conditions, neurological conditions, and fluctuating health conditions ruling themselves out too early, when they may still qualify for support.

“One of the biggest misconceptions is that you need to be unable to work or extremely unwell to qualify for PIP, but that’s not the case.”