Can you speed up a Social Security Disability Hearing Decision?

Usually, when people use the phrase "speed up" in conjunction with a disability hearing, what they really mean is "Can I speed up my request for a disability hearing?" And the answer to that question is, yes, you can sometimes be successful in getting your hearing request expedited if you have a dire need basis for having this done, or if you contact a sentaor or congressman's office to have a congressional inquiry done. Unfortunately, not everyone with dire need will most likely be successful in getting their request for a hearing speeded up. And, likewise, not every congressional hearing will result in an expedited request for a hearing.

In this post, however, the question is "Can you speed up a social security disability hearing decision?". And the general answer to that question is no, you can't. Reason? Because a federal disability judge cannot be made to move any faster on processing cases.

But, there is one scenario where a claimant, or a claimant's attorney, can speed up a hearing decision. In situations where a hearing has been held and the judge decides to keep the file open in order that additional medical records can be gathered (typically, this happens when records that have been requested have not arrived by the time of a hearing), a person can effectively speed up their hearing decision by taking an active role in their case.

In other words, if the judge is waiting on a batch of medical records that have been requested but have not arrived, it may be in the claimant's best interests to physically get the records themselves. Of course, this may not always be practical or possible. However, if the records in question are at the office of the claimant's doctor, it may be very practical for the claimant to make a special visit to their doctor in order to personally request their records, and wait for them to be copied in the office.

I should point out that the wait for medical records typically poses the largest, and longest, roadblock to the processing of disability claims. For disability applications that have just been filed, in fact, about 75 percent of the processing time of the case involves the case file sitting in a filing cabinet while the disability examiner waits to receive the medical records that have been requested.










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Social Security Disability Secrets

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