How to use these resources

If you are an adviser

Some of our template letters are published on the site for you to download. The others are available on request from: [email protected]. When using the templates, please follow these steps:

  1. Email a summary of the case (including the date of the decision you want to challenge) to [email protected].
  2. We'll email you to advise whether a pre-action letter is appropriate, and will either check that the template you planned to use is the most suitable or help you identify whether we have a relevant template.
  3. If a pre-action letter is appropriate, we can review your client’s evidence, and either support you to complete the letter template, or to draft your own letter.
  4. Even if a pre-action letter is not appropriate, we'd be happy to send you any of the templates if they'd help you challenge the decision in a different way.

If you are a benefit claimant please find an adviser to support you as our judicial review project can only work with advisers. You may be able to find an adviser on advicelocal.uk.

Advisers in Scotland
The judicial review project covers England and Wales. If you're an adviser working in Scotland and want to use our template letters, please use them with caution as the pre-action protocol doesn't apply in Scotland. See Advisers in Scotland using the judicial review letter templates. We'd be happy to send you any of the templates which are not currently available to download.

Templates on benefits for migrants and refugees

EU pre-settled status

For pre-settled status after 9 May 2019, please refer to our test cases page on Fratila and another v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions 2021] UKSC 53 for information on CPAG's pre-settled status legal challenge. 

If your client has any other qualifying right to reside seek a mandatory reconsideration of the DWP's decision to refuse UC without considering your client's alternative right to reside.

If your client has pre-settled status, is destitute or has an alternative right to reside, and their UC claim has been stayed behind SSWP's appeal in SSWP v AT, see our test case page on SSWP v AT (AIRE Centre and IMA Intervening) [2022] UKUT 330 (AAC); SSWP v AT [2023] EWCA Civ 1307 for further resources. The Supreme Court refused the Secretary of State permission to appeal on 07/02/24. The successful Court of Appeal decision is now final. The resources on this page relating to AT have therefore mostly been removed pending updates. 

Templates on benefits for claimants who have survived domestic abuse

Habitual residence test

DWP failure to make enquiries to the Home Office or HMRC to establish a claimant's right to reside (JR41)

DWP delay deciding UC claim by person with leave under the Migrant Victims of Domestic Abuse Concession due to application of HRT (JR88)

Stopping unwanted payments into domestic abuse survivors' bank accounts

Please get in touch if you have a client in this situation as the DWP has indicated it may be able to resolve individual cases, and we are happy to forward cases to them. Please contact [email protected], we will provide and authority form for your client to sign, manually or digitally.  

The DWP's legal advisers have provided the following response to correspondence from CPAG:

"...we are concerned by the cases you report where the individual has notified DWP but been told that the payment into their account cannot be stopped even where they can evidence that they are the account holder. We are committed to the prevention of abuse and we do have measures designed to support people who flee violent and abusive households. 

In light of your correspondence we will be investigating further the operational and evidential processes and considering if there are further measures required to manage this situation. In the meantime, if you do have the details of any particular individuals who are receiving their ex-partner’s UC payments into their account against their will, we can ensure they are passed to the appropriate team for consideration if they would like us to do so."