Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has completed checking 600,000 Employment Support Allowance (ESA) claims for underpayments as part of a corrections exercise it started in December, 2017.
ESA was introduced in October 2008 for people who have limited capability to work because they are disabled or ill. From March 2011, the DWP began reassessing people on incapacity benefits - for example, Incapacity Benefit and Severe Disablement Allowance - for eligibility for ESA.
More than two million claimants were receiving incapacity benefits before reassessments began and the DWP have now reassessed around 1.5 million people, nearly all of those who required a reassessment.
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