Disability benefit claimants are often waiting for more than a year for their claims to be processed as the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) routinely misses its targets, the Commons spending watchdog has warned.
In a wide-ranging report, the cross-party Public Accounts Committee (PAC) found numerous failings at the DWP, including missed targets, unclear planning, and a lack of transparency.
Just over half of new claims for the Personal Independence Payment (Pip) were processed within the department’s target of 75 working days in 2024/25, the group of MPs write, well below its 75 per cent target.
MPs on the committee said they knew of “constituents who have waited a long time for their claims to be processed, in some cases over a year”.
They add that people are being pushed into debt and poverty as a result, with many disability claimants now expecting “reliably poor service”, according to chair Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown. The DWP “does not have an adequate plan to improve this in the short term,” the report finds.
Pip is a payment to help with extra living costs for people with a long-term physical or mental health condition or disability who have difficulty doing certain daily tasks.
The PAC noted that while the department said the experiences they described “were not showing in its statistics”, the DWP “acknowledged that it was obviously a genuine situation that it needed to address”.
The department added that it was testing an online application process in some areas which has cut the time taken to process claims by 20 days.
The committee also noted that a target previously announced by the DWP to process up to 20 per cent of Pip claims using the new online service by 2026 had been pushed to 2029 and branded this “far too long for claimants to have to wait to get a better service”.
Among its recommendations and asks, it has called on the DWP to provide more detailed data on waiting times, including the longest wait recorded in 2024/25.
An ongoing review into Pip, led by social security and disability minister Sir Stephen Timms, is expected to report by autumn – although the government has said an interim update expected before then.
It was announced following a partial U-turn in summer 2025 which saw changes to Pip eligibility stripped out of the government’s welfare legislation, amid warnings from rebel Labour MPs of the impact on disabled claimants.
The committee also raises concerns that the DWP “does not have assurance that shortening the first meeting a universal credit claimant has with a work coach to 30 minutes (from 50 minutes) will not adversely affect the support it provides”, and said it should set out how it will monitor the impact of the cut.
It called for greater transparency about how job centres perform in order to “enable effective local scrutiny”, and noted that while welcoming of plans by DWP to address risks associated with its legacy IT systems, “implementing these plans over the next three years will be highly challenging”.
Sir Geoffrey said: “The summer of last year was consumed by debate around proposed changes to the benefits system, with government insisting changes to Pip would be mitigated by support for disabled people and people with long-term conditions to get back into work.
“Our report exposes the incoherence with which government made these arguments, while cutting the all-important support provided by work coaches which could help those same people access the labour market.”
The veteran Conservative MP adds: “Our focus will remain trained on what mitigating action will be taken by DWP on this issue, as well as its overall efforts to modernise its services by reducing its reliance on out-of-date technology. For claimants who rely upon this system’s proper functioning, this programme of transformation cannot come quickly enough.”
Evan John, policy advisor at the national disability charity Sense, said: “Benefits are a lifeline for many disabled people with complex needs, yet too many people face unacceptable service while trying to access support they urgently need.
“The Department for Work and Pensions needs to work with disabled people to improve how benefit claims are handled, making sure everyone can access the support they are entitled to as easily and as quickly as possible. It’s also crucial the government does not cut disability benefits any further, which could push even more people into poverty.”
James Taylor, director of strategy at disability equality charity Scope said: “Time and again disabled people are being let down by our benefits system. Continued delays are unacceptable.
“Pip is a lifeline for disabled people. The cost of living is still sky high and disabled people are far more likely to live in poverty.”
A DWP spokesperson said: “We’re fixing the broken welfare system we inherited by giving claimants the support they need to move into good, secure jobs and out of poverty.
“We’ve redeployed around 1,000 work coaches to help sick or disabled people who have been left behind, alongside the most ambitious employment reforms for a generation.
“These reforms are being delivered as we replace outdated systems through our ambitious £647 million modernisation programme.
“We always aim to make Pip award decisions as quickly as possible, and the Timms Review is looking at Pip as a whole to make sure it is fit and fair for the future.”