Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what is the average wait time for a decision to be made on awarding a Personal Independence Payment claim; and how many Personal Independence Payment claimants are waiting over six months for a decision.

In answer to (a), Personal Independence Payment (PIP) clearance times are available as part of the PIP Official Statistics quarterly release. The latest release, with data available to July 2022, is available here: tables-pip-statistics-to-july-2022.ods (live.com).

Table 1A in this release shows that median average clearance times for normal rules new claims are currently (July 2022) 18 weeks “end to end” (from registration to a decision being made).

In answer to (b), as of July 2022, the number of new PIP claims registered under normal rules who had been waiting over 6 months for a decision was 21,600.

Notes:

Source: PIP Atomic Data Store (ADS)

• Data regarding claims outstanding for more than 6 months is unpublished. It should be used with caution and may be subject to future revision.
• The status of claims as 'normal rules' and 'new claim' is shown as at the point of the claim registration. It is possible for claims to transition between normal and special rules, and between new claims and reassessments, during the course of the claimant journey.
• In analysis for the answer to (b), claimants waiting ‘more than 6 months’ is interpreted as claimants who registered prior to 31^st January 2022. This is because the dataset holds data up to 31^st July 2022.
• Data provided is for England and Wales.