The Short Answer
Personality Disorders can qualify for PIP where it limits the assessed activities on more than half of the days over a 12-month period. Engaging with other people face to face is the activity most directly engaged, and it carries the widest descriptor gap. Points come from the descriptors the condition engages, not from the diagnosis, and both components can reach either rate.
How Personality Disorders Affects the 12 Activities
The activities below are the ones whose published assessment guidance names the functions a personality disorder is commonly reported to affect.
| Activity | What it assesses | Descriptors typically engaged | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daily living 9 — Engaging with other people face to face | engaging with other people face to face, including where social support is needed | b, c, d | 2–8 |
| Mobility 1 — Planning and following journeys | planning and following journeys, including journeys not undertaken because of overwhelming psychological distress | b, e | 4–10 |
| Daily living 4 — Washing and bathing | washing and bathing, including where prompting is needed to start or finish | c | 2 |
| Daily living 1 — Preparing food | preparing and cooking a simple meal, including where prompting or supervision is needed | d, e | 2–4 |
| Daily living 3 — Managing therapy or monitoring a health condition | managing medication and monitoring a condition at home | b, c | 1–2 |
| Daily living 10 — Making budgeting decisions | making budgeting decisions, which turns on cognitive function | b, c | 2–4 |
| Daily living 2 — Taking nutrition | taking nutrition, where an underlying condition affects the ability or motivation to eat | d | 4 |
Last checked: 7 August 2026
Where this mapping comes from
Descriptor letters and point values are reproduced from Schedule 1 of the Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013. The activities listed are the ones whose published assessment guidance names the functions this condition is reported to affect. No activity is listed on any other basis.
Activities are numbered as Schedule 1 numbers them, within each component: daily living 1 to 10 and mobility 1 to 2.
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 9: “Social support means support from another person trained or experienced in assisting people to engage in social situations or someone directly experienced in supporting the claimant themselves (for example a family member or carer).”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 9 descriptor D: “Overwhelming psychological distress means distress related to a mental health condition or intellectual or cognitive impairment which results in a severe anxiety state in which the symptoms are so severe that the person is unable to function.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 4: “Consideration should be given to the claimant's functional restrictions to see if they: could reasonably use an aid such as a grab rail to get in or out of an unadapted bath or shower (4B) or whether they require assistance (4E) to get in and out of an unadapted bath or shower.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 1: “If an individual cannot cook at all because they have never needed to learn, consider their ability to carry out activities at or above waist height and their cognitive ability to use a stove or microwave if shown how.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 3: “Examples of therapy include physiotherapy, home dialysis and special diets where both attention to the nature and timing of food is integral in the management of the diet.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 10: “The age of the person or whether they have ever done any household budgeting is irrelevant - it is their ability to make budgeting decisions and their level of cognitive function that is relevant.”
- DWP PIP Assessment Guide, activity 2: “The frequency of taking nutrition should only be considered if the claimant has an underlying condition which affects their ability to remember to eat, or their motivation to eat e.g. dementia or severe clinical depression or an eating disorder.”
The remaining activities are not closed; they are simply less often engaged. Where a personality disorder coexists with another condition, the whole assessment is in play, and a claim described under one heading alone will leave those activities blank.
Points You Could Score
8 points in a component pays the standard rate; 12 points pays the enhanced rate. Regulations 5 and 6 of the PIP Regulations 2013 set both thresholds, and the two components are scored separately so their points never combine.
Prompting to engage scores 2 points; needing social support to engage scores 4, and the guidance defines social support to include a family member or carer directly experienced in supporting you.
To score your own case activity by activity, use PIP points calculator, which is pre-filtered to the activities above.
Evidence and Assessment
Evidence that names an activity beats evidence that names the diagnosis. The diagnosis is rarely disputed; what the descriptors ask about is what happens when you attempt a task.
- A psychiatry letter recording the diagnosis and the treatment offered
- A care plan under the Care Programme Approach, naming the tasks support is provided for
- A record of a structured therapy programme — DBT, MBT or a therapeutic community — with attendance
- A repeat prescription list covering any medication prescribed for mood, sleep or anxiety
- A crisis or safety plan, and a record of crisis team contacts
- A written statement from a person who prompts or accompanies you, describing what they do and how often
A care plan and a crisis plan name the tasks support is provided for. Attendance records for a structured therapy programme date the period the claim covers.
At the appointment itself, the reliability criteria are what to keep in view: an activity counts as done only where it can be done safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time. Those four elements come from regulation 4 of the PIP Regulations 2013, and each is a separate ground on which a task can fail. What the PIP assessment guide covers, and how to prepare, is set out on the assessment hub.
Rates and Back Pay for Personality Disorders Claims
The same rates as any award, and the same backdating rules.
| Award | Weekly | Every 4 weeks |
|---|---|---|
| Daily living standard | £76.70 | £306.80 |
| Daily living enhanced | £114.60 | £458.40 |
| Mobility standard | £30.30 | £121.20 |
| Mobility enhanced | £80.00 | £320.00 |
Last checked: 6 August 2026
An award runs from the date of the claim, so the months spent waiting for a decision are paid as arrears rather than lost. Where a claim is refused and later won at reconsideration or tribunal, the award still reaches back to the original claim date.
Where Personality Disorders Sits Among Other Conditions
No condition ranks above another, because the regulations name none of them. Personality Disorders is assessed on the same 12 activities as every other condition, and the list of conditions that can qualify for PIP exists to show how each maps onto those activities rather than to rank them.