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Atos Healthcare: Arranging a home visit for your Work Capability Assessment

Most people who make a claim for Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) need to attend a face to face disability assessment. For a number of different reasons some people feel they’re unable to travel to an assessment centre and would like their assessment – known as the Work Capability Assessment (WCA) – to take place in their home.

This blog post explains who’s entitled to a home visit and how to arrange one.

Who’s eligible?

There’s no fixed set of criteria that determines whether or not you’re entitled to a home visit for your WCA. It depends on your individual circumstances, determined by the information you provide us with.

Usually, a home visit will only be carried out if you’re unable to leave your home for any reason. If you’re able to attend GP or hospital appointments, you’ll normally be expected to go to an assessment centre for your WCA.

How can you request a home visit?

If you feel you’re unable to attend the appointment that has been booked for you in one of our assessment centres and would like to request for your assessment to be carried out in your home, you can call our Contact Centre on 0800 2888 777.

You’ll be asked to provide information in writing from the medical professional who’s treating you (usually your GP) to explain why you’re unable to travel to an assessment centre. We’ll also look at the detail you’ve provided us with in your self assessment questionnaire. One of our healthcare professionals will then decide, based on this information, if you’re eligible for a home visit.

Unfortunately, Atos Healthcare can’t help you with any fees your medical professional may charge you for providing a letter.

It’s important that you let us know as soon as possible if you need to arrange a home visit. If we haven’t heard from you, you’ll be expected to attend your appointment at the assessment centre.

If you miss your WCA, whether at the assessment centre or at your own home, you’ll be sent a separate form asking you to explain why you weren’t available. You’ll need to fill this out and send it to the Jobcentre Plus office that’s dealing with your claim. If they believe you have good cause for not attending your appointment, they’ll refer your case back to us and we’ll get in touch to arrange another appointment.

What can you expect during a home visit?

An assessment carried out by one of our specially trained healthcare professionals during a home visit is very similar to one that takes place in an assessment centre. The aim is to examine how your illness or disability affects you in your day to day life.

We’ll ask you questions like:

•   how your medical condition affects you in your daily life;
•   whether your condition varies from day-to-day, or over periods of time;
•   the difference between what you can and can’t do; and
•   if you have a condition that affects your mental health, how this affects your daily life.

If relevant to your condition, we may also need to carry out a physical examination. This could include blood pressure, sight or hearing tests, a general physical exam and a limb examination, which may involve some limited stretching, standing and bending.

You won’t ever be asked to do anything that might cause you discomfort or pain.

Every assessment’s different, but they usually last somewhere between 20 and 60 minutes. We’d always suggest allowing up to 2 hours just in case, although it’s unlikely to take that long.

As with assessments that take place at our centres, you can have a relative, carer or companion in the room with you during your WCA. We’d encourage you to do so if you feel you’ll find it helpful.

What happens next?

After the assessment, the healthcare professional who carried out your WCA will use the information you provided, and their findings from any physical examination, to complete a medical report.

We send this report onto the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) so they can make a decision on your claim. The DWP will then get in touch with you directly to talk to you about your entitlement.

If you have any other questions or would like any more information on the WCA, take a look at the frequently asked questions section of our site.

Atos Healthcare: Getting in touch about your Work Capability Assessment

If you’ve recently made a claim for Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) through Jobcentre Plus, it’s likely that Atos Healthcare will soon be getting in touch with you about your claim.

This blog post provides an overview of why and how we’ll be making contact with you.

Why would Atos Healthcare get in touch with me?

Most people who make a claim for ESA need to fill out a Limited Capability for Work self assessment questionnaire (also known as an ESA50 questionnaire.) This form gives you the chance to set out how your health condition affects your ability to work and carry out day to day activities.

Atos Healthcare manages this process on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), so you’ll receive the questionnaire from us, along with a letter explaining how and when to return it to us once you’ve filled it in. We’ll also send you a reminder letter to let you know if we haven’t received your completed questionnaire.

Do you get in touch with all ESA claimants?

We send out the ESA questionnaire every time the DWP refers your claim to us. This might happen several times during your claim. You’re sent the questionnaire each time so you’re able to record the latest information about your condition.

How will you contact me to arrange an ESA assessment?

The majority of people need to take part in a face to face assessment, known as the Work Capability Assessment (WCA), according to the criteria set out by DWP. In some cases though we are able to advise DWP that we have enough medical evidence and that a face to face assessment isn’t necessary. We do this by reviewing the information you’ve provided in your questionnaire and we may also contact your GP or the healthcare professional who’s treating you.

Atos Healthcare - Getting in touch about your WCA

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If DWP agree that you don’t need to come to a face to face assessment, they’ll contact you next with any further information about how your claim will progress. You’ll only hear from us again if and when you’re referred again by DWP to Atos Healthcare.

If you do need to attend an assessment, we’ll contact you next by phone to arrange an appointment at an assessment centre near you.

If for any reason we can’t get in touch with you by phone, we’ll send you a letter with a date and time for an appointment. We’ll also always send you a letter confirming your appointment date, time and location.

Can I get in touch with you if I have questions before my assessment?

If you have any problems or questions in advance of your WCA, you can get in touch with us using the contact details included in the letter you’ll have received confirming your appointment.

If you’re not able to make your appointment, you can call us to rearrange it, but it’s important to note that we aren’t allowed to rearrange your appointment more than once. If for any reason you’re not able to attend your rearranged appointment, we’ll need to send your information back to Jobcentre Plus. They will then let you know whether or not you can rearrange your appointment a second time.

Is there anything I need to do?

Before your assessment, please let us know if you have any problems or special needs. We should be able to accommodate these, but it’s important that you let us know if you:

• are going to have problems getting to the assessment centre;

• are unable to come for your assessment on the agreed date and time;

• need a sign language interpreter – please let us know no later than two days before your assessment;

• need a language interpreter – please let us know no later than two days before your assessment;

• need help at the assessment centre or will have specific needs during the assessment; or

• can only do the assessment with a healthcare professional of the same sex – we’ll try our best to provide one for you, but this may not always be possible.

Can I get in touch with you if I have questions after my assessment?

After your WCA we’ll provide the DWP with an independent report, which they’ll use, alongside the other information they have available, to determine your claim. The DWP will then get in touch with you directly to talk to you about your entitlement.

Our healthcare professionals can’t make any decisions about your benefit and won’t have any information on the outcome of your claim.

If you have any further questions about your claim or benefit, or would like to see a copy of your assessment report, you can contact Jobcentre Plus. The phone number’s usually on any letter you’ve received from them, or you can call 0800 055 6688 to find out the right number to use. If you have speech or hearing difficulties you can contact Jobcentre Plus using a text phone on 0800 023 4888.

The Atos Healthcare contact centre

The Atos Healthcare contact centre was established to support customers in making appointments for attending assessments in relation to their claims for disability-related benefits. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) requires us to ask the majority of customers across different benefits to attend a face to face assessment with a healthcare professional. So arranging appointments is a key part of what we do.

Making an Appointment

Like DWP, Atos Healthcare will always contact customers in writing to confirm the time and place of their appointment. However, we know also that customers are much more likely to be able to attend if the time has been agreed together with them. So the contact centre calls thousands of customers each month to talk to them and set up an agreed time for their assessment. If a customer has a particular issue or need, this phone call also gives them an opportunity to talk about it, whether it be a specific appointment time or the need for an interpreter. In the last 2 months we made over 260,000 contacts with customers and made over 134,000 appointments during those calls.

Contacting Atos Healthcare

Of course we aren’t able to make contact with everyone but the contact centre number is included on all appointment letters so customers can call us if they are unable to attend for any reason.

We are open from 8am to 8pm Monday to Friday and 9am to 5pm on a Saturday. In March/April 2012, we received approximately 170,000 calls from customers of which over 110,000 were about rearranging an appointment. Our call answer rate was just under 88%. The number of calls we receive can be very unpredictable and can increase dramatically at short notice so please bear with us if you experience a delay.

Attending Appointments

A lot of effort goes into agreeing an appointment because that is how we can deliver better service when customers come into our assessment centres. Many people will have seen signs in places like GP surgeries about the importance of attending appointments. It’s a known fact that the more certainty there is in how many people will attend on the day, the more efficient the service can be in seeing those people. Our contact centre has a key role to play in talking to customers, answering their questions and giving them any support they need to be able to attend their appointment.

Common Queries

As well as appointment logistics, the contact centre also deals with many queries that customers may have about the process in general. In March/April about 60,000 of our calls were general queries. We do try to answer as many as we can, but some queries can only be answered by DWP or the local Jobcentre dealing with a customer’s claim. These include:

Reasons why a customer was unable to attend their appointment – DWP need to know this so they can decide how to proceed with a claim

Requests for a copy of the medical report following an assessment – this can only be issued by DWP

Queries about a benefit decision, DWP decide on benefit based on all evidence, not just an Atos Healthcare report.

Any questions about payment of benefit – we don’t hold any information on any aspect of customer’s benefit payment

Requests for a new copy of the questionnaire (known as the ESA50) – only DWP are permitted to issue a new copy.

For information on any of the above topics, customers should contact their local Jobcentre Plus office dealing with their claim.

We are very happy to answer questions about booking interpreters, how to request a home visit if travel is not possible because of a medical condition , bringing companions to the assessment, directions to the assessment, what to bring with you to the assessment. For answers to these questions and more, please visit our Frequently Asked Questions on the Disability Assessments section of our website.

Atos Healthcare blog