I was made redundant in August 2006 and decided to take 6 months off work as I'd always worked from being 16 (except I had 2 years off to have my kids). I'd signed on to work with a temping agency and was awaiting my CRB check to come through. There was plenty of work at the agency and I was more than qualified.

Whilst waiting for the CRB, some idiot driving a skip lorry ran into me from behind, I ended up with whiplash which in turn has now caused bad back pain. I've not worked now since 2006 and was wondering if I could claim any benefits. I've had MRI's, xrays, scans and other investigations on my back, I've had spinal injections and facet injections, and loads of physio, neither of which helped me. I'm going to the Pain Clinic at NGH later on this month, as I'm still in a great deal of pain. I've been told i've now got degenerative disc disease so it's not going to get any better.

I can't sit at a desk or stand up for long periods of time either. So I don't think I'm going to be able to work again (I'm 50) so it's still a long way to retirement. My husband works full time.

I've never claimed any help from the government in any way before, so don't know what to do or where to go first. Just wondered if anyone could help me as I'm at a loss as to where to start.:help:

Thanks

Your local job centre should be able to point you in the right direction .You could ring a benefit office ask for an application form for DLA or what was incapacity benefit. Hope you get sorted.

And, as has been said many times on here, get expert help from the Citizen's Advice Bureau, in filling it in,

a) because it's such a devil of a form to wade through, and

b) because the CAB staff know the right words and phrases to use, filling the forms in day in, day out, to maximise the chances of succeeding in your claim.

good luck

PT is quite right. the main benefit you'll want now is "employment and support allowance" and the starting point is to ring 0800 055 6688 ASAP. DLA is an additional benefit paid to people with "severe disabilities" - the number i use is 0800 44 11 44 to claim. this is the one you will certainly need help with on the forms.

Depending on how much your husband earns, don't even bother claiming ESA. You won't have had enough personal National Insurance Credits in the last two years, so your claim will be income based, and almost certainly you won't get any help.

Unfortunately, you should have claimed Incapacity Benefit (as it was) when you were first ill. Unfortunately, you can't back date this claim to a point where you would have been able to claim.

Very crap; I know.

Disability Living Allowance is a different matter, but you really do need to have help completing the form. Be prepared for a benefit adviser from a CAB or other advice centre to take a good two hours to go through it all thoroughly and properly.

Thank you all for your helpful posts. I will be getting in touch with CAB once the snow has gone and I can get there.

The reason I didn't claim initially was because all the docs kept saying it will get better, just give it time, so I thought I'd be able to work again. After having the last lot of spinal injections (which were really, really painful) which didn't work the docs are now saying its degenerative disc disease so won't get better. Basically I would have had the back pain in the future, the car accident just brought it forward by a couple of years.

Ann