My prior authorisation checklist

Started 27 March 2026 · 17 replies · 106 hearts · read 1.8k times

FitzLimerick, IE · 27 March 2026

4 months ago

My prior authorisation checklist — putting it in its own thread so it does not get lost in the check-in.

Money post. No apologies, this circle is for it.

What I need is the practical sequence. Who to contact, in what order, with what attached, and how long each step took.

What I cannot find anywhere is the criterion I am being assessed against, and I suspect that is the whole of my problem.

Any experience welcome, including the ones that did not work out. I would rather know what I am walking into.

TarnKeswick, UK

My appeal succeeded on a technicality about how a criterion was measured, which I would never have spotted without reading their policy.

MarthaCork, IE

To the opening post rather than to the thread: Fitz, this is my version of it.

Something practical: I sent everything recorded delivery and referenced the previous letter by date in every new one.

PetraFacilitatorMelbourne, Australia

Stepping in with something rarely offered unprompted: in most of the systems represented here there is a further review beyond the one that has just refused you. Ask what comes after this stage, and ask for the answer in writing.

BodilÅlesund, NO

I found the process demoralising and the outcome good, and I want both halves of that on the record.

TheaBergen, NO

Reading and nodding. Nothing to add, and I wanted you to know somebody had read it.

TasnimBradford, UK

What surprised me was how routine this is at their end. My refusal was not personal and treating it as procedural made it much easier to fight.

TiernanOmagh, NI

I would say get everything you have already been told in writing before you start, because verbal assurances evaporate.

NkechiAbuja, NG

Tasnim has already said most of this and I want to add the one part that was different for me.

The flowchart I drew of the process was genuinely useful and I have since sent it to four people in this circle.

4me too 3

WinkleWeymouth, UK

Tiernan — yes, and the bit that took me longest to accept was the next part.

Coming back to say mine was granted on the third attempt, sixteen weeks after the first refusal, and the letter that worked was the shortest one.

BrimHalifax, UK

#10

A refusal letter is a first draft. Mine was overturned on the second attempt and nothing about my situation had changed, only the paperwork.

5me too 6

ColNewquay, UK

#11

Reading Winkle, I recognised more of that than I expected to.

My employer's HR had a route I did not know existed and it went through in eleven days after four months of getting nowhere myself.

IdaRotterdam, NL

#12

Something that helped was a template somebody here shared, which I rewrote in my own words and which gave me the structure I was missing.

GroverPortland, ME

#13

I kept a log of every call with the date and the name and it was the reason my complaint was taken seriously at the third stage.

RayBarnsley, UK

#14

What I got wrong was appealing emotionally. The letter that worked was boring, numbered and entirely factual.

ZebAustin, TX

#15

Something I would flag: ask whether there is an independent review stage, because there usually is and it is rarely advertised.

PetraFacilitatorMelbourne, Australia

#16

Gently redirecting: the question was about the appeal deadline, which is time-critical, and we have spent five replies on whether it is worth appealing.

11me too 8

TarnKeswick, UK

#17

What helped was treating it as an administrative task with steps rather than as a judgement on me, which took me two refusals to manage.