Winter Fuel Allowance advice

1
1295

Murcia
February 15, 2016

Please, please, please can you give me and no doubt 1,000’s of other expats the requirements to dispute Winter Fuel Allowance rejections.
Myself and my wife have applied and of course been rejected (thank you, Ian Duncan-Smith) .
We have today requested by email to DWP that they send the rejections to formal appeal (HM Courts and Tribunal Services).
This information was noted from an article printed in the Costa Blanca News by A Watkins over 12 months ago. However it also stated that we need to also register an appeal with the EC.
Can you supply the necessary info with reference to which EC dept/website to use? Basically, can you advise us and all the other expats of the exact procedures to follow to receive that which we paid in for all our working lives. And whilst on the subject, I hope all you pensioners out there had a whale of a time spending your Xmas bonus, which has not increased for donkey’s years (hee-haw).
The WFA info is urgent as all requests must be made by March, I believe?

Colin Day

Complaints about Winter Fuel Payments have been made to the European Commission by the British Expatriates Association, who have full details about the action they have been taking on their website, www.ukgovabusesexpats.co.uk. They addressed their complaint to Antonella Schulte-Braucks, Head of Unit, European Commission, DG Employment, Social Affairs & Inclusion, B-1049 Brussels, Belgium.
David Burrage of the association provided us with extensive information about the status of the complaint procedure, which is too long to include here but we have sent a copy on to Mr Day.
Mr Burrage told CBNews in December:
“The news media have mainly been reporting on this matter as if the newly invented temperature criterion was a done deal, whereas it most certainly is not because the criteria breach the fundamental principle of proportionality and is fully supported by the settled case law of the Court of Justice.
“We have now joined forces with campaigners in France and the current situation is that the Commission are still considering the legitimacy of the temperature criteria should the Commission again attempt an appeasement policy with the UK we will escalate this matter to a national court of ‘Final Instance’, who will be obliged under Article 267 of the TFEU to send the matter to the Court of Justice for a Preliminary Ruling (Interpretation of the Community law which turns on this matter.”

Alex Watkins

Read more in this week’s print edition or go to e-paper

1 COMMENT

  1. We moved to Spain in December 2015. By the end of Jan.2016 I had not received my WFA and so phoned the DWP who said I did not qualify because I was living in Spain. When I pointed out that I was living in the UK on the Sept. qualifying date there was a hesitant pause before I was told “the matter would be looked into”. A week later I received a letter from the DWP saying that they had considered my appeal and would pay my WFA. This arrived in my bank 2 days later.
    If anyone reading this moved after Sept. 2015 do not let them fob you off.

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