Help needed re working and benefit entitlement

Hi, Can anyone advise me, I recently went from DLA high to low rate care and mobility, I appealed using your excellent guides, and my tribunal date was set for next week, meanwhile after an Atos medical I got moved from wrag group into the support group, then today I received a telephone call from DLA saying that they had reviewed my case and have cancelled the tribunal appeal and have awarded me high rate care and mobility again indefinably, I believe I am now also entitled to a severe disability premium, due to getting the high care rate, I also get council tax support, paying £28 per month water rates, I have a mortgage so don’t get any help with rent or housing costs. So why am I concerned, you may wonder. The problem is I have just been offered an office job with flexible hours 20 hours a week with a gross wage of £250 a week, the job is a sit down job and I can also take the work home to do, so think I could manage it, but what would be the situation with my benefits and would I be actually worse off by doing this job. I also fear that after a few weeks I will find I can’t manage it, would this then mean a completely new claim? I hope someone can offer me a bit advice as I do not have a clue of how the benefits system works, and can’t decide what to do for the best. Thank You, I hope someone can give me some help with this dilemma.

Hi Elaine,

I will help with what I can and leave the rest to more experienced mods.

You might be able to get DWP to agree to your doing 'permitted work'. However, ou would need to contact them and get thei explicit consent that the work you are considering would be classed as 'permitted'. As you are in the Support Group their is no limit to the length of time you are permitted to do such work.

This would not impact on your DLA - unless the work you do directly clashes with the claims you have made on your application form (to take an extreme example, you should expect eyebrows to be raised if you were to get a job as a postman after claiming that you could not walk, or self-propel, for more than 50m).

If you were to terminate your ESA claim in order to take up work, you could reclaim within 12 weeks and linking rules would apply. After this it would be treated as a new claim and you would have to prove that you met the contributory or income-related criteria.

Ah, thank you for picking this up Gordon!

Thanks Gordon, I just thought that because I would be working the majority of hours at home it might be considered acceptable, but I can see what you mean, it may at the very least raise suspicion that If I was capable of doing any sort of work, I may not be as disabled or need care at the higher rate.
Thank you both for your help and advise.