Income Support Claimant pre 03/04/17 in receipt due to sickness/ disability and UC Managed Migration

Is there a work around, so that a claimant in receipt Income Support (Claim pre 03/04/17 in receipt due to sickness/ disability); would not have to go through a work capability assessment before the LCW element can be included from the start of the award. The client in question, has multiple ill health and disabilities.

Reg 22 Universal Credit (Transitional Provisions) Regulations 2014 (UC (TP) Regs).

You’ve sort of answered your own question haven’t you? Reg 22 provides that if a WCA concludes that the claimant has LCW/LCWRA then that is applicable from the start of the award. Its inherent in that provision that there needs to be a WCA.

There doesn’t necessarily need to be an in-person assessment with a HCP if that is the concern - a paper assessment is still possible if appropriate - but the exercise of establishing which descriptors apply needs to be gone through. The difference of one of these (rare) cases with someone migrating from ESA is that the ESA claimant will have already had a WCA.

The significance of 03/04/17 is that this is the date on which the WRAC / LCW element ceased to be payable in relation to new claims for ESA/UC. In the event that your client is found to have LCW, they would be entitled to the LCW element because of the saving provision at para 15, Sch. 2 of the Employment and Support Allowance and Universal Credit (Miscellaneous Amendments and Transitional and Savings Provisions) Regulations 2017. Perhaps one of a tiny handful of people who skipped over ESA entirely to whom that provision would apply.