WinVisible (women with visible & invisible disabilities) is a multi-racial grassroots group based on collective self-help. It brings together women with various disabilities, from different backgrounds, including women seeking-asylum, migrants and LGBTQI+ women.
Since 2023, Universal Credit (UC) has been replacing a range of existing means-tested benefits and tax credits for working-age households.
Note: Those claimants who receive contribution based ESA only will not be part of this managed migration exercise.
In September 2024, the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) began the final stage of its “managed migration” roll-out exercise by beginning to ask those receiving income-based employment and support allowance to claim UC. The DWP aims to complete the managed migration from ESA to UC by April 2025.
The new Winvisible guide is comprehensive, outlining what you can do to keep your benefits, what rights you have alongside helpful tips.
It includes such sections as:
- What the government is doing
- How Citizens Advice ‘Help to Claim’ can help
- Your choices – can I stay on ESA?
- Financial risks of staying on ESA
- Maximise your benefits before you start your claim
- Things to know about payments
- Gap in payments and financial hardship
- I need more time
- If you miss your deadline to claim UC
- Ways to start your UC claim, and accessibility
- Keeping your ‘support group’ status or WRAG status
- I need ‘reasonable adjustments’ due to disability
- Ways to prove your ID
Winvisible says: “Women in our group and from the community have been contacting us about the move from ESA to Universal Credit (UC).
We want to share what we found out — what you can do to keep your benefits, what rights you have, and some helpful tips.
Get in touch if you want to add useful info from your own experience, or other suggestions.”
ESA to Universal Credit – things to know & helpful tips is available from https://winvisible.org.
DR UK has a Guide to Universal Credit available from disabilityrightsuk.org.