All Benefits Claimants urged to request audio recordings of their ATOS interviews as deaths mount over fitness for work tests

ANYONE facing fitness for work test for benefit eligibility by ATOS, who conduct the interviews on behalf of the Department of Work & Pensions (DWP) are NOW URGED to request a recording of their interview with ATOS staff to ensure their details are correctly registered, along with a record of how the claimant is treated by ATOS.

The message to all those who are required to undertake interviews with ATOS comes amid increasing complaints over how staff from the private health firm brought in by the Condem Westminster Government in an attempt to cull reduce benefits claimants payments.

Unsurprisingly, it has since come to light many claimants are unable to obtain a recording of their interview as the DWP only bought 11 machines, some say over fears that audio recordings would be published by claimants showing what is alleged in some cases “outright hostility & prejudice against their circumstances”.

It has also been pointed out that due to a large number of deaths linked to decisions taken as a result of ATOS interviews with claimants, a figure reported to be running at 32 deaths a week and now well over 1000 dead, recordings of interviews in cases where claimants have subsequently died, as a result of decisions taken to stop their benefits or force them into work, may have proved useful to families & relatives who may wished to have raised legal actions against the Government & ATOS over the deaths of their loved ones.

It has also emerged many of the interview centres operate CCTV facilities, footage of which has been identified as being included in some claimants files, along with transcripts of what claimants have said while awaiting their interviews.

Given the apparent use of CCTV coverage including audio recordings obtained in waiting areas, a high profile transparency campaigner has today recommended Benefits claimants attending ATOS interview centres should request an audio recording of their interview and also a copy of any CCTV coverage which identifies them.

The Guardian newspaper has reported on difficulties of claimants obtaining audio recordings of their ATOS interviews in a report here :

Fitness-for-work tests hit by technical chaos 

Private firm Atos found to have just 11 audio machines to record up to 11,000 tests for benefit eligibility each week Amelia Gentleman guardian.co.uk, Friday 20 July 2012 17.28 BST

Employment minister Chris Grayling has been asked to explain the mounting chaos around fitness-for-work tests. Photograph: Suzanne Plunkett/Reuters

Employment minister Chris Grayling has been asked to provide an explanation for mounting chaos surrounding the fitness-for-work assessment, amid complaints over the transparency of the process.

New unhappiness with the system, run by the private firm Atos, has emerged over individuals' requests to record their assessment as a way of ensuring that their details are correctly registered.

Claimants were given the right to request a recording last year. But the Department for Work and Pensions only bought 11 recording machines – shared between 123 assessment centres – which test 11,000 people every week. Several are currently broken.

A number of reports by charities have highlighted inaccuracies in the testing process, which determines eligibility for the new incapacity benefit and Employment and Support Allowance. Many claimants are anxious to record their assessments to make sure the account of their health problems is correctly reflected. Large numbers of cases are currently going to tribunal because applicants believe they have been wrongly refused benefits; around 40% of cases are overturned in the claimant's favour at tribunal.

Despite a government promise that everyone is entitled to record their assessment, many people have been told there are no machines available, because they are being repaired, and that they must go ahead with the test anyway. Individuals have been told they are not able to record assessments with their own devices "in view of security and confidentiality considerations".

In a statement on its website, Atos says: "We will make every effort to accommodate requests for this service and hope that we will be able to meet demand. However, under the terms of our contract with the department, we cannot postpone an assessment on the basis of audio-recording." Atos's refusal to postpone tests is at odds with a statement made by Grayling in a response to a written question on the subject posted by the Labour MP Frank Field, this week when he promised: "Clients will be told in advance that their request cannot be accommodated and offered a later date."

He added that: "Large scale purchase of machines in the absence of an evaluation of the process is not effective use of public money."

The shadow employment minister, Stephen Timms, who has written to Grayling to highlight his concerns about the lack of recording equipment, said: "I find it hard to believe that a company with a multimillion pound government contract is incapable of obtaining and operating sufficient recording devices."

A DWP spokeswoman said several machines had broken in transit and there had initially been a very small number of requests for recordings, which was why only 11 machines were bought. "It is simply not true that the recording machines are all broken, in fact we are in the process of buying more and fixing the few that have encountered problems."