Dear Whoever Thought Medical Assessments for Disabled People Were a Good Idea,
Last month I was asked to…no….summoned to attend yet another one of your God awful medical assessments. I assume this is because I am in receipt of a state benefit, due to my disability and every year the government like to check that I am in fact, still genuinely deaf.
Once again, I went into the same room and answered the same questions with the same answers.
I have not sprouted new ears that have miraculously recovered my hearing loss and I doubt I ever will.
The dead nerve endings in my ear have not suddenly reanimated into bizarre undead nerve endings that can hear stuff again.
And if they did, then the zombie nerve endings would probably eat my brain before I got to tell any one about it.
I still lip read, I still sign a bit, I still wear hearing aids and I still can’t hear stuff. I am still definitely deaf.
Now, I understand that you must weed out the fakers and fraudsters who are trying to scam money from the tax payers and I hope I passed your highly scientific test that proves I’m not one of those people. (It wasn’t insulting at all.)
But is it really necessary to call me in EVERY year to check that I’m still deaf? Perhaps, at the very least, we could not have those awkward questions that don’t really relate to deafness at all.
I’ve also had this rather marvellous idea, that once someone has passed the fraudster test, you could file that info somewhere and not call them back anymore. Think of all the money you could save on the paper work alone!
Why, it might even amount to something like…£30 a week…I wonder where you could resource that to?
Yours ‘whateverly’ as you’ve probably stopped reading by now,
Teresa Garratty
P.S. Can’t wait until next year….
Teresa is a freelance film maker, photographer and full time cynic. At school, she was voted “Most likely to end up in a lunatic asylum”, a fate which has thus far been avoided. Her pet hates are telephones, intercoms and all living things.
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Linda Richards
April 15, 2016
It strikes me that, for starters, every single named supporter of The Limping Chicken could copy this letter onto their website or communications and show true support for our causes. Then the bigger boys who are not supporters of this site but who claim to have the ear (no pun intended!) of the government could also copy this letter. Then, others of us, could copy it onto our Facebook page, and encourage its sharing… Hey, with such coverage, it might actually get through to those who thought that “medical assessments for disabled people were a good idea” and review the futility of this exercise.
Tim
April 15, 2016
Why is the taxpayer paying for this? They have to pay again for tribunals etc on the many occasions that these private firms get it wrong. They’re paid a pretty penny just to make disabled people’s lives a misery.
I”m happy to re-blog if that’s OK?
Keith
April 15, 2016
I guess another type of fraud this annual visit requirement should unearth is the one where the benefit claimant has, in fact, passed away since the last visit and some unscrupulous relative/friend/ne’er-do-well is continuing to claim disability benefit on the deceased person’s behalf. :-/ Just sayin’
sybil
April 15, 2016
I’m in the U.S., so things are a bit different- I don’t think we have to test annually for government benefits, but the initial getting disability assistance is such a bear, it might even out. I’ve been told the wait is 6 months. Don’t expect any real contact before that!
Once in a while, though…..
My father is Deaf. He has pretty much always been Deaf. He always attended a boarding school for the Deaf and even went to Gallaudet for a while. He has had many jobs, some of which required being around loud noises. (He told me that the printing places he worked -newspapers, etc- liked hiring the Deaf back in the day. No worries about having ear protection, and they tended to be less distracted by the noises around them. Of course.)
The point of all that is: there are reams of proof that he doesn’t hear. At all. When he was told he would have to take the hearing tests again to apply for Social Security, he went, but it was a waste of time since he hears nothing. Ever.
As far as fraudulent claims for dead people, coming to an office and doing a quick check of a photo ID and filling out a form and turning it in to be filed. (And if you’ve lied, they’ve got extra charges for filing false documents.if their people check things off, they don’t have that extra bit.) it really would save time in the cases that have already been approved. They could even have an express window: verify identity and drop off forms. Then they could use that time for cases that need more attention: people who need help with written forms, appeals.
I think- I hope- that the questions you were asked were ‘determine the disability’ and ‘determine the assistance needed’ questions. Hopefully, they don’t think being unable to hear somehow keeps you from being able to dress yourself🙄 You are absolutely right about that one- once the disability has been recorded in their files, they should focus the questions. You can always tell them if there are new disabilities to add to your case.