PIP telephone assessment: what to expect and how to prepare

The guide does not hand assessors a list of set questions. Part 1 tells them how to ask: open questions such as "Tell me about..." and "How do you...", closed questions to establish a fact such as how often medication is taken, clarifying questions and extending questions (1.6.9), and "open-ended questions and not just by asking a series of closed questions" about daily activities (1.6.29). Part 2 sets out, for each activity, what the activity covers. What follows is that material, paraphrased, as the topics your questions will be about. That link between the guide's notes and the questions you will hear is our reading, not a quotation. The guide says the health professional is a registered practitioner who has met DWP's requirements on training, experience and competence (foreword).

Before the activities. The health professional records when your conditions began and how they have changed, how often episodes occur and how long they last, with the number of good and bad days over a period (1.6.12, 1.6.14); your treatments and how well they work (1.6.13); all current medication including over the counter, with dose, how often, purpose and side effects (1.6.17); where you live, who with, whether you reach every room, any adaptations, and leisure you have given up (1.6.20); and your work, if any (1.6.21 to 1.6.23). The typical day also covers housework, shopping, caring and hobbies, and what completing one thing does to the rest of the day (1.6.27).

The 12 activities, from part 2 of the guide (sections 2.3 and 2.4):

• 1. Preparing food. Preparing and cooking a simple meal for one from fresh ingredients: "prepare" is making food ready for cooking or eating, "cook" is heating it at or above waist height. Carrying items and bending to an oven are not part of it. It looks at what you are able to do, not at a skill you never learned. Topics: aids, using a microwave instead of a cooker and why, reminders, supervision or help, and whether peeling and chopping is possible.
• 2. Taking nutrition. Cutting food, getting it to your mouth, chewing and swallowing, or tube feeding with a rate-limiting device. What you choose to eat is not considered. Topics: adapted cutlery, choking risk, and needing prompting to eat or to stop eating because of a condition.
• 3. Managing therapy or monitoring a health condition. Taking medication, spotting significant changes in your condition and acting on them, and therapy done at home that a registered health professional prescribed or recommended. Topics: dosette boxes and alarms, reminders or help with medication, and for therapy, the time spent being supervised, prompted or helped each week. Inhalers, needles, meters and nebulisers are devices, but help to use them counts.
• 4. Washing and bathing. Washing the whole body and getting in and out of an unadapted bath and shower. Drying and shaving are not covered. Reaching the upper spine is not considered, because most people cannot. Topics: grab rails and other aids, and help getting in or out.
• 5. Managing toilet needs or incontinence. Getting on and off an unadapted toilet, emptying the bladder and bowel, and cleaning afterwards. Managing clothing, stairs and getting to the toilet are not covered. A stoma or permanent catheter counts as incontinence here. Topics: commodes, raised seats, bottom wipers, pads (including used as a precaution), and help.
• 6. Dressing and undressing. Putting on and taking off appropriate unadapted clothing, judged by what you can do, not by how you choose to dress. Topics: aids such as button hooks, reminders about suitable clothes for the weather or the occasion, and help with the upper or lower body.
• 7. Communicating verbally. Expressing and understanding what is said, in your native language, with basic information (a simple sentence) and complex information (more than one sentence). Topics: clarity of speech, hearing aids, and communication support from someone trained or experienced in communicating with you. Memory is not covered.
• 8. Reading and understanding signs, symbols and words. Reading and understanding basic and complex information in your native language, indoors and outdoors. Braille does not count as reading here, and not being able to read is only considered if it comes from a health condition. Topics: spectacles, magnifiers, and someone explaining or reading information.
• 9. Engaging with other people face to face. Interacting in a socially appropriate way, understanding body language and establishing relationships, with people generally and not only those you know well. It is designed for limits that come from mental health, cognitive or learning conditions, and must be due to the condition, not preference. Topics: prompting, social support from someone trained or experienced, and overwhelming psychological distress.
• 10. Making budgeting decisions. Simple decisions (the cost of goods, change) and complex ones (household budgets, paying bills, planning purchases). It looks at your function, not at your choices, unless a bad decision comes from a health condition. Reduced sight or mobility are not relevant here.
• 11. Planning and following journeys. Planning a route in advance, leaving home and setting off, and following the route. It is designed for limits from mental health, cognitive and sensory conditions. Topics: familiar and unfamiliar journeys, prompting, needing another person, an assistance dog or a specialist orientation aid (a long cane counts, phone navigation does not), and overwhelming psychological distress, for which the guide says the threshold is very high.
• 12. Moving around. Standing and then moving 20, 50 and 200 metres outdoors on a surface such as a pavement, kerbs included, without severe discomfort such as breathlessness, pain or fatigue. Topics: aids such as sticks, crutches and prostheses, gait, speed, falls, and how far you can go repeatedly. The guide gives average paces: normal 61 to 90 metres a minute, slow 40 to 60, very slow below 40 (2.2.21).

Comparing across activities. The assessor is told to compare activities that need similar abilities. The guide's example: if you cannot chop vegetables without an aid because of weak hands, they would expect difficulty with other tasks needing similar dexterity, and if you drive but say you cannot do other tasks needing similar dexterity, they should explore it with you (2.1.26). Saying how each of those differs is part of the account.

Informal observations are part of the evidence DWP decision makers use. The guide says they can reveal abilities and limitations not mentioned in the form or the history, and can show differences between reported and actual need, but must be balanced against evidence from professionals who have seen you more regularly (part 1, 1.6.31).

• When they start. From the start of the consultation. On the phone or video the consultation starts when you begin to converse with the health professional and ends when you end the call, and the guide says they cannot record observations made outside it (1.6.32).
• What can be noted on a phone call. The guide's own example is manner and behaviour, such as tearfulness, and hearing ability. Observations are written into the report, for example "I observed them..." (1.6.32).
• How they are used. To check whether the evidence fits together. Where they find a difference, the guide says the health professional must weigh it and decide, with full reasoning, which descriptor is most likely to apply (1.6.34).
• Setting. The guide notes that an assessment room can make function look better than it is in daily life, and that a home can be ideal or poor depending on, for example, background noise. The health professional is to explore function in everyday life and in situations that are not ideal (1.6.33).
• Simple movements, face to face. GOV.UK says they might ask you to do some simple movements to show how you manage some activities. The guide says you should not carry out a movement or activity to the point where it causes you discomfort (1.6.40).
• What cannot be seen. The guide says to take into account symptoms such as fatigue and pain that are hard to see or explore through observation (1.6.35).

Our suggestion, not a rule in the guide: the assessor cannot see you on a phone call, so if something is happening as you talk, such as pain, losing your words or needing to stop, say so.

Each activity is tested against regulation 4(2A) of the Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013. Where C's ability to carry out an activity is assessed, C is to be assessed as satisfying a descriptor only if C can do so - (a) safely; (b) to an acceptable standard; (c) repeatedly; and (d) within a reasonable time period.

Regulation 4(4) defines the terms. "Safely" means in a manner unlikely to cause harm to you or to another person, either during or after completion of the activity. "Repeatedly" means as often as the activity is reasonably required to be completed. "Reasonable time period" means no more than twice as long as the maximum period that a person without a condition limiting that ability would normally take. "To an acceptable standard" is not defined, and the guide says it takes its ordinary meaning, "good enough" (2.2.12).

Regulation 7 sets how often: a descriptor applies where it is satisfied on over 50% of the days of the required period, and a descriptor counts on a day if it is likely that you would have satisfied it had you been assessed that day. The required period is the 3 months ending with the prescribed date together with the 9 months after it. GOV.UK puts it this way: you must have difficulty with tasks most of the time, meaning more than half of the days over a 12-month period.

These tips come from the sections above. Have your appointment letter, your form and anything you sent with it, your medication list and your diary where you can see them, as the health professional reads your form and evidence before the consultation (1.6.5) and records your medication (1.6.17). Decide in advance about recording and about who will be with you. Describe a typical day and good and bad days, not only your best or worst hour. For each activity, say how long, how often and what it costs you. Before the call ends, say what is missing.

The sheet below puts those reminders on one page to print and fill in by hand. It holds no answers and says nothing about what to put.

Recording. GOV.UK says that from 29 June 2026 all telephone and face-to-face appointments are audio recorded, that this applies to PIP, and that you can ask for yours not to be recorded without being disadvantaged. To opt out, contact the Health Assessment Advisory Service before the appointment using the number at the top of your appointment letter, or tell the health professional at any point. Opting out applies to that assessment only. Video assessments cannot be recorded because of technical limitations, and GOV.UK says to contact them before your appointment if recording matters to you. GOV.UK also says decision makers will not use recordings to make their decisions.

Your copy. Ask for it during the assessment or by calling the number on your letter. GOV.UK says you will get a text message with a secure link, that you need a smartphone and your National Insurance number, that the link works for 7 days, and that you can download it more than once only within 24 hours of the first download. If you cannot, you can make a Right of Access request or write to DWP. GOV.UK says the recording may be used only in relation to your claim and must not be published or reproduced, and that DWP normally keeps it for 24 months (audio recordings at health assessments).

Your own recording. The guide covers two cases. It says a video recording of a consultation is not permitted (1.6.64). And if you have opted out of the provider's recording and want to use your own device, the provider should clarify your opt-out with you, and if you still want to opt out, neither side records (1.6.61).

Companions. The guide says claimants have a right to be accompanied, by a parent, family member, friend, carer or advocate (1.6.53). Usually one or two companions attend (1.6.54). The consultation is mainly between you and the health professional, but a companion can help answer questions where you or the health professional wish it, and what they say is recorded (1.6.55, 1.6.58). A companion is in the room for an examination only if you and the health professional both agree, and takes no part in it (1.6.57).

Notes. You and a companion are entitled to take notes for your own purposes, and you do not have to give a copy to the health professional (1.6.66).

Before the call ends. The guide says the health professional should give you an overview of the findings, including how much your function varies, invite you to clarify points, ask whether there is anything else you want to include, and try to respond to concerns (1.6.48).

The report. If you ask for a copy, the guide says the health professional is not authorised to give you one at the consultation and that you can request it from DWP (1.6.50). GOV.UK's page on requesting your personal information says you can ask DWP for information held about you, lists work capability and health assessments among the examples, and gives an online form or a letter to Right of Access Requests, Mail Handling Site A, Wolverhampton, WV98 2EF, with your full name, address and postcode, date of birth and National Insurance number, and a description of the information and the period it covers. DWP says it will reply within one calendar month of getting your request. We did not find a GOV.UK page that names the PIP assessment report specifically, so this combines the guide's instruction with that general route. The audio recording is requested separately, as above.

The decision. GOV.UK says you get a letter telling you whether you will get PIP. A first award is between 9 months and 10 years. If you disagree, you can ask for mandatory reconsideration.

The deadline. GOV.UK says you usually need to ask for mandatory reconsideration within one month of the date on your decision letter, and if you write, the letter or form must arrive by then. You can ask after one month for a good reason, such as being in hospital or a bereavement, and you must explain why it is late. You do not need to ask for a written statement of reasons for PIP, as the decision letter includes one (before you start). Explain what part of the decision is wrong and why, and send only evidence you have not already sent. Once you have the mandatory reconsideration notice you can appeal, usually within one month of its date (if you disagree with the outcome). See GOV.UK for the full process, our mandatory reconsideration guide, and what to look for in the report.

• GOV.UK, PIP: after you've applied, and what PIP is for
• GOV.UK, audio recordings at health assessments
• GOV.UK, request your personal information from DWP
• GOV.UK, mandatory reconsideration
• DWP, PIP assessment guide for assessment providers: part 1 and part 2 (edition of 31 August 2026)
• Regulation 4 and regulation 7, Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013