How to Describe PIP Activities in Writing: A Plain English Guide With Examples

The PIP form and any challenge you make to a PIP decision ask you to describe how your condition affects you when carrying out specific activities. For most people, this is where the whole process either holds together or falls apart.

It is not enough to say you struggle. It is not enough to name your diagnosis. What the DWP is looking for is a precise, specific, daily account of what happens when you attempt each activity on the majority of your days. The language you use, the level of detail you provide and the way you connect your experience to the activity in question all directly affect your score.

This guide shows you exactly how to describe each PIP activity in writing, with worked examples showing the difference between answers that are dismissed and answers that carry weight.

The Formula That Works for Every Activity

Before getting into each activity, understand the framework that works across all of them. Every description you write should follow this pattern:

1. Name the specific difficulty

2. Explain what causes it and how often it happens

3. Describe what actually happens or what you cannot do

4. Describe any help, aids or adaptations you rely on

5. Describe the consequences or after-effects

Apply this to every activity and you produce descriptions that are specific, verifiable and directly linked to the descriptor criteria. Apply it consistently and the assessor or decision-maker cannot miss what you are telling them.

The word ‘because’ is your most important tool.

Every difficulty you describe should be followed by a ‘because’ that connects it to your condition. ‘I cannot prepare food because my grip strength is severely reduced by rheumatoid arthritis’ is far stronger than ‘I find cooking hard.’ The word ‘because’ builds the causal link that the assessor needs to see.

The Four Standards PIP Uses to Judge Every Activity

The PIP assessment guide makes clear that an activity only counts as achievable if it can be done safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time. If any of these four conditions fails, the activity is not truly achievable at that level. When writing your descriptions, check each answer against these four tests.

• Safely: Without risk of harm to yourself or others. If you can do something but regularly hurt yourself attempting it, or if there is a genuine risk of injury, describe that.

• To an acceptable standard: To the level that would be expected of someone without your condition. If the result is significantly below what would be considered adequate, describe that.

• Repeatedly: More than once within a reasonable period. If you can do something once but are then too fatigued or in too much pain to do it again, describe that.

• In a reasonable time: Within the time it would normally take. If a task takes you three times as long as it would take someone without your condition, describe that.

Describing Each PIP Activity: Guidance and Examples

Activity 1: Preparing Food

This activity covers planning what to cook, preparing ingredients including washing and chopping, cooking safely using appliances, and serving a meal. When writing about this activity, think about every step involved in making a basic hot meal for one person and where your condition creates difficulty in any of those steps.

Common difficulties to describe include inability to grip knives safely, pain from standing at a worktop, inability to carry hot pans or dishes, forgetting steps or leaving hobs on, not recognising when food has spoiled, and fatigue that makes the whole process impossible to complete safely.

Weak: I find cooking difficult because of my condition.

Strong: I cannot safely prepare or cook a hot meal without assistance or supervision. I have rheumatoid arthritis in both hands and my grip strength is severely reduced, meaning I cannot hold a knife safely or grip pan handles. I have dropped pans on three occasions in the past year, twice burning myself. Standing at the worktop causes significant pain in my lower back within five minutes, which means I cannot complete a cooking task without sitting down repeatedly. On around 20 of every 30 days my pain and fatigue levels make any cooking impossible and I rely entirely on cold food, pre-prepared items or meals cooked by my partner.

Activity 2: Eating and Drinking

This activity is about more than whether you can physically eat. It covers cutting food, using cutlery, chewing and swallowing safely, managing mealtimes at an appropriate pace and recognising when food is safe to eat. If you have difficulty swallowing, require adapted utensils, need to have food cut for you, eat very slowly due to fatigue or cognitive issues, or are at risk of choking, this is the place to describe it.

Weak: I sometimes have difficulty eating.

Strong: I have dysphagia as a result of my neurological condition, which means I am at significant risk of choking if I eat without modified food textures or without someone present. My speech and language therapist has recommended a soft and bite-sized diet. I use adapted cutlery with built-up handles as I cannot grip standard cutlery reliably. I require someone to be present during mealtimes on the majority of days in case I choke or need assistance. This is confirmed in my speech and language therapy report dated [date].

Activity 3: Managing Treatments

This covers managing medication schedules, administering treatments, monitoring health conditions and attending appointments for treatment. Think about whether you can remember to take medication without prompting, whether you can manage complex regimes safely, whether you can administer injections or change dressings, and whether the physical act of managing your treatment poses difficulties.

Many people with cognitive difficulties, mental health conditions or fluctuating conditions underestimate how relevant this activity is to them.

Weak: I take medication daily for my condition.

Strong: I take eight different medications across morning, midday and evening doses. Without external prompting I regularly forget doses or confuse morning and evening medications, which poses a risk of under-medication and overdose. My husband uses a labelled pill organiser and sets alarms to remind me at each medication time. On days when he is not present I have made dosing errors on multiple occasions. My GP has written confirming the risk of unsupervised medication management given my cognitive impairment. I also require supervision when changing my wound dressings as I cannot manage the physical manipulation safely alone.

Activity 4: Washing and Bathing

This covers getting in and out of the bath or shower safely, washing all areas of your body including hair, and drying yourself. Think about balance and the risk of falling, the physical effort involved, pain from reaching or standing, and fatigue that affects how often or how thoroughly you can wash.

Be honest about how often you bathe and why. If you can only shower twice a week because the physical cost is too high, say so. There is no judgement in this process, only assessment.

Weak: I struggle to shower because of my pain.

Strong: I can only shower once or twice a week because the physical effort involved causes a significant worsening of my fibromyalgia symptoms that takes one to two days to recover from. I cannot stand in the shower for longer than three minutes before the fatigue and pain become severe. I use a shower chair and grab rail, which were installed following an occupational therapy assessment. Even with these aids I cannot wash my hair without assistance as raising my arms above my head for more than a few seconds causes intense pain in my shoulders. My partner washes my hair for me approximately twice a week. On days following a shower I am largely unable to carry out other activities due to the after-effects of the effort.

Activity 5: Managing Toilet Needs

This covers getting to the toilet in time, managing clothing before and after, cleaning yourself adequately, and managing any continence issues. Many people find this section uncomfortable to write. It helps to remember that the form is read by healthcare professionals whose only purpose is to assess need.

Describe accidents, urgency, the need for aids or adaptations, difficulties with clothing fastenings, and any support you require. If continence issues are relevant, describe the frequency and impact on your daily life rather than leaving them out.

Weak: I have some difficulties with the toilet due to my condition.

Strong: I have urge incontinence caused by my multiple sclerosis, which means I need to reach the toilet within three to four minutes of feeling the urge. On the majority of days I have at least one accident because I cannot move quickly enough. I use a commode in my bedroom at night as I cannot safely navigate to the bathroom in time if I wake. I require assistance with fastenings on clothing as the urgency means I cannot manage buttons or zips in time. My neurologist’s letter of [date] confirms this is a direct symptom of my MS and is likely to continue.

Activity 6: Dressing and Undressing

This covers choosing appropriate clothing for the weather and occasion, physically putting on and removing clothing, and managing fastenings including buttons, zips, clasps and laces. If you need someone to help you dress, if you rely on adaptive clothing, if dressing takes a very long time or causes significant pain, or if you regularly make inappropriate clothing choices due to a cognitive condition, describe this specifically.

Weak: I struggle to dress myself because of my condition.

Strong: I cannot fasten buttons or zips due to severe loss of grip and fine motor control in my hands caused by my peripheral neuropathy. I own no clothing with these fastenings. I require assistance from my carer every morning to dress, including putting on and removing footwear as I cannot balance on one leg safely to do this independently. Getting dressed takes approximately 45 minutes with assistance and leaves me in increased pain for the following two to three hours. On particularly bad days I remain in nightwear as the effort involved in dressing is too great regardless of assistance.

Activity 7: Communicating Verbally

This covers expressing yourself verbally, understanding what others say to you, and managing verbal communication in real-time situations. This activity applies to far more people than might expect it to, including people with cognitive difficulties, severe anxiety, autism, acquired brain injury, hearing impairment, stammer, aphasia or conditions affecting processing speed.

Describe what actually happens in practice. Do you lose words mid-sentence? Do you need information repeated or written down? Do conversations in groups or with strangers become unmanageable? Do you need someone with you to help communicate?

Weak: I find it hard to communicate due to my anxiety.

Strong: My severe anxiety disorder means I am unable to initiate or sustain verbal communication with unfamiliar people without significant distress. In practice this means I cannot make phone calls to organisations, cannot communicate with professionals at appointments without my sister present, and often lose the ability to form sentences in stressful situations. I regularly experience physical symptoms including shaking, inability to speak and dissociation when required to communicate under pressure. At my last GP appointment I was unable to speak for several minutes. My sister now attends all medical and official appointments with me and communicates on my behalf. This has been the case for the past three years.

Activity 8: Reading and Understanding Signs, Symbols and Words

This activity is about your ability to read and understand written information. It applies not only to people with visual impairments but to anyone whose condition affects their ability to process written text, including people with severe dyslexia, cognitive impairment, brain injury, certain mental health conditions affecting concentration, and learning disabilities.

Describe what you can and cannot read reliably, whether you need information in alternative formats, and whether you require someone to read and explain written information to you.

Weak: I have difficulty reading because of my condition.

Strong: My acquired brain injury has severely affected my ability to process written text. I can read individual words but cannot reliably understand sentences or paragraphs. I am unable to read letters, forms, or written instructions independently. My daughter reads all correspondence to me and explains what it means. I cannot use online services that require reading without someone assisting me throughout. In situations requiring reading, such as at appointments or when signing documents, I need a trusted person present to interpret the information for me. This has been the case since my injury in [year] and has not improved.

Activity 9: Engaging With Other People Face to Face

This question is widely misunderstood. It is not about whether you enjoy socialising. It is about whether your condition makes it impossible or very difficult to engage with other people face to face without significant distress, support or assistance.

People with severe social anxiety, PTSD, psychosis, autism, agoraphobia, or conditions affecting emotional regulation may score points here without realising it. Describe what happens in practice when you try to interact with people, particularly strangers or in unfamiliar settings.

Weak: I find social situations difficult and try to avoid them.

Strong: I cannot engage with people face to face outside my immediate family without experiencing severe panic attacks. When I am required to interact with strangers I experience racing heart, hyperventilation, dissociation and, in many cases, I am physically sick beforehand. I have not left my home to attend any appointment, shop or public setting alone in over two years. My mother accompanies me to all appointments and manages all interactions with professionals. I have cancelled medical appointments on five occasions in the past year because I was unable to manage the face-to-face contact involved. My psychiatrist’s letter of [date] confirms that severe social anxiety is a primary feature of my condition and significantly impairs my daily functioning.

Activity 10: Making Budgeting Decisions

This covers your ability to manage money and financial decisions in everyday situations, including understanding prices, handling cash, calculating change, avoiding financial exploitation and managing household finances. People with cognitive impairments, learning disabilities, acquired brain injuries, dementia or conditions severely affecting executive function and concentration may find this activity relevant.

Weak: I struggle to manage money because of my cognitive difficulties.

Strong: My cognitive impairment means I cannot reliably manage financial transactions or household finances without daily support. I am unable to calculate change, and have frequently paid far more than necessary in shops and paid bills multiple times. I have been the victim of financial exploitation on two occasions when traders took advantage of my difficulty understanding amounts. My support worker manages my bank account and pays my bills on my behalf. I carry only a small amount of cash and my support worker accompanies me to any shop to prevent financial errors. This level of support has been in place since my diagnosis in [year].

Activity 11: Planning and Following Journeys

This covers your ability to plan a route, navigate to unfamiliar places, use public transport, manage anxiety in transit situations and reach destinations safely. This activity applies far more broadly than physical mobility alone. People with severe anxiety, autism, cognitive difficulties, agoraphobia, PTSD or conditions causing disorientation may score points here even if they can physically walk.

Describe what happens when you try to travel. Whether you can use public transport, what prevents you, whether you need someone to accompany you and to all destinations, and what happens when you attempt to travel independently.

Weak: I cannot use public transport because of my anxiety.

Strong: I cannot travel to any unfamiliar location without a companion. I have become disoriented while walking to my local GP surgery, which I have attended for twelve years, on four separate occasions in the past year due to my condition affecting my spatial awareness and memory. I do not use public transport at all. Travelling in enclosed spaces with strangers causes severe panic attacks that have required me to leave vehicles mid-journey. My husband drives me to all appointments and accompanies me wherever I need to go. I have not made an independent journey beyond the street where I live in over 18 months.

Activity 12: Moving Around

This activity is specifically about your physical ability to walk, measured in metres. The scoring bands are: more than 200 metres, 50 to 200 metres, 20 to 50 metres, and under 20 metres. When writing about this activity, describe how far you can walk on a realistic day without stopping, what happens to you during or after walking that distance, and what aids you use.

Important: describe your unaided walking ability. If you use a wheelchair or mobility scooter for longer distances, describe how far you can walk without those aids, as the activity tests your physical capacity to walk, not your ability to get around.

Weak: I cannot walk very far because of my condition.

Strong: On the majority of my days I cannot walk more than 20 metres before I need to stop due to severe breathlessness caused by my heart failure. Walking even short distances causes chest pain and dizziness that does not resolve until I rest for 10 to 15 minutes. On particularly bad days, which occur on approximately 15 days per month, I cannot walk further than my front door. My cardiologist confirmed at my last appointment in [month] that my exercise tolerance is severely reduced. I use a wheelchair for any journey beyond the inside of my home. Without the wheelchair I would not be able to leave the house safely.

Describing Fluctuating Conditions: What to Say

If your condition changes from day to day, you need to describe this pattern clearly rather than describing an average. PIP is assessed on the majority of days, meaning the days that occur more than 50 percent of the time. If your worst days or your moderate days are the majority, those are the days the assessment should reflect.

A common mistake is to describe a mid-point between good and bad days. This produces a description that undersells the genuine level of need on the days that actually occur most often.

My condition fluctuates significantly. I would estimate that around 18 to 20 days per month my symptoms are at their most severe. On these days I am unable to wash, dress or prepare food independently and require full assistance. On the remaining days my symptoms are less severe but I still require assistance with most daily tasks. I rarely have days where I can manage independently without any support.

If you have kept a daily diary recording your symptoms and what you could or could not do each day, reference it and offer to provide it. A diary that covers three to four weeks before submission is one of the strongest pieces of evidence available for a fluctuating condition.

Describing Mental Health Conditions: Breaking the Pattern of Understatement

People with mental health conditions consistently understate their difficulties on PIP forms, often because they do not think of their condition as a ‘proper’ disability, or because describing it feels like admitting weakness. Contend legal PIP guidance  makes clear that severe anxiety, depression, PTSD, OCD, eating disorders, bipolar disorder and psychosis can all qualify for PIP where they substantially affect daily activities.

When describing mental health, apply the same framework as physical conditions. What activity are you describing? What specifically happens when you attempt it? How often does this occur? What is the practical impact? What support or avoidance strategies do you rely on?

The avoidance trap: Many people with mental health conditions describe what they can do rather than what they actually do. If you avoid an activity because of your condition, that avoidance is itself evidence of impact. ‘I do not go out’ is not the same as ‘I can go out.’ If anxiety prevents you from engaging with an activity, describe that prevention and what causes it, even if you technically have the physical ability to attempt the task.

A Sentence Formula You Can Use Right Now

If you are staring at a blank box on the form and do not know where to start, use this formula for each activity:

I [cannot / struggle to / need help to] [activity] because [condition] causes [specific symptom or difficulty]. This happens [frequency]. When I try, [what actually happens]. I need [what support or aids]. The effect on me is [consequences or after-effects].

Applied to washing and bathing this might look like:

I cannot wash my hair independently because my chronic fatigue syndrome means raising my arms above shoulder height for more than a few seconds causes severe pain and immediate exhaustion. This happens every day. When I try, my arms feel unbearably heavy within moments and I need to rest for an extended period afterwards. My partner washes my hair for me approximately twice a week. The effect on me is that I am often unable to do anything else on days I have washed my hair due to the exhaustion it causes.

Self-Check Before You Submit

6. For each activity, have you named the specific difficulty rather than describing a general struggle?

7. Have you used the word ‘because’ to connect each difficulty to your condition?

8. Have you described what happens on your majority days rather than your best days?

9. Have you addressed all four standards: safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time?

10. Have you described any aids, adaptations or support from others that you rely on?

11. Have you described the after-effects of attempting activities, including fatigue, pain and recovery time?

12. If your condition fluctuates, have you described the pattern and the frequency of your worse days?

13. For mental health conditions, have you described what you actually do rather than what you technically could attempt?

14. Have you referenced any supporting evidence such as professional letters, assessment reports or a diary?

If you want a professional review of your written descriptions before submission, or help structuring your answers to ensure they reflect the full impact of your condition accurately, the team at LetterLab can help. What you write at this stage shapes every subsequent part of the process.

The Key Takeaway: Specifics Win, Generalities Are Dismissed

The PIP assessment is not a test of how severe your condition is in a medical sense. It is a test of how your condition affects your ability to do specific things on most of your days. The form cannot score what it cannot see, and it can only see what you describe.

Every answer that says ‘I struggle’ without explaining why, how often and with what consequences is an answer that leaves points on the table. Every answer that names a specific difficulty, connects it to your condition, describes its frequency, and explains what you cannot do as a result is an answer that gives the assessor exactly what they need to score it correctly.

Write about your real daily life. Be specific. Use the word ‘because’. Describe your worst majority days, not your best occasional ones. The description you produce is the foundation everything else is built on.