When You Apply For Disability Do You Get It From The Day You Were Disabled Or The Day You Apply?

From the standpoint of the social security administration, disability is synonymous with the inability to engage in work activity; in other words, an individual's state of disability begins when they become unable to perform substantial gainful work activity due to the effects of a disabling condition or conditions.

However, and this can be confusing for applicants, this does not necessarily mean a person who has filed for disability will be paid disability benefits back to the day they became disabled. This is because the date of application and the date of disability onset (when you became unable to work according to SSA) both play an important role in determining when you will be able to receive disability benefits. It is also because the two disability programs administered by SSA treat the issue of retroactivity differently.

A couple things to keep in mind with regard to SSD, or social security disability:

1) If you are entitled to Social Security disability, you are allowed twelve months of retroactive disability benefits from the date you file your disability application, provided, of course, that you have not been able to perform substantial work activity for at least seventeen months and that your medical records will support an early enough onset date.

2) Social Security disability has a five-month waiting period (in which no disability benefits are paid) that begins with the onset date and lasts for five full months. This means, if you became disabled on January 15, you would not be entitled to receive disability benefits until July.

Conversely, Supplemental Security income disability, a.k.a. SSI, begins with the month of application for disability.

Although Supplemental Security Income disability, or SSI, beneficiaries do not receive retroactive benefits prior their application date, they have the advantage of no waiting period. Consequently, if you are filing for SSI and are found disabled per your application date, you will receive disability benefits from the month you made your application for disability benefits provided that you meet the SSI program income and resource limitations. And if your case has been in the system for quite some time, as is often the case, you may be eligible for a considerable amount in back pay, or past due benefits (which people often get confused with retroactive benefits).

It should be said, of course, that most applicants who are approved for social security disability or SSI disability do end up receiving at least some amount in back pay ---though, as was indicated earlier, "retroactive benefits", or benefits that may be owed to a claimant prior to the filing of a disability claim, only apply to social security disability and not SSI.

A couple things to keep in mind with regard to SSI disability:

1) You may remain entitled to both disability programs if your Social Security disability (monthly) benefit amount remains lower than what is currently the full, or maximum, SSI monthly benefit amount.

2) Even if your Social Security disability benefit amount is more than the SSI monthly amount, you still may be able to receive SSI disability benefits for the five-month Social Security disability waiting period provided you meet the SSI disability income and resource limits.





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Social Security Disability Benefit Questions



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Can You Apply For Disability If You Used To Get Disability But Went Back To Work?

Social Security disability is available to an individual even if they have received disability benefits in the past. Many individuals receive disability benefits more than one time in their life, especially if they suffer from some chronic medical and/or mental condition (s).

Contrary to what many mistakenly believe, Social Security disability benefits do not replace an individual’s total income, and most individuals who receive disability benefits suffer some financial hardship. Consequently, at some point after being approved for disability, many individuals make an attempt to return to work in order to better provide for themselves and their families, even if their disabling condition continues to affect them.

There are a couple of possibilities open to an individual who had received disability in the past...but had returned to work and then found themselves unable to work due to their impairments.

The most common possibilities are a new disability claim or an expedited reinstatement. If an individual’s disability was terminated due to work activity (without a finding of medical improvement) and the disability termination month is less than five years in the past, they may be eligible to receive an expedited reinstatement of their disability benefits.

An expedited reinstatement gives an individual six months of provisional benefits while Social Security determines if they are still disabled according to the rules and guidelines of the Social Security disability program. Additionally, they must be alleging the same medical impairment (s) as their previous disability claim to file an expedited reinstatement.

Unfortunately, expedited reinstatements are not allowed for disability applicants whose disability benefits were terminated more than five years in the past or individuals who were found to have medically improved. If this is the case, the individual will have to file a new disability claim in order to be awarded disability benefits again.

In summary, there is no limit to the amount of times an individual can file for disability and be approved for disability. If an individual had disability benefits in the past but lost them for whatever reason, they are allowed to file a new disability claim with Social Security.




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Social Security Disability Secrets

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What Happens If You Apply For Disability And All You Have IS Old Medical Records?

If you only have old medical source records when you apply for disability, Social Security will still request the old records. Social Security prefers to have at least twelve months of records to establish a longitudinal medical history for your physical and/or mental impairment (s); however, current medical treatment records (medical records that are no more than ninety days old) are also needed to make a medical disability determination.

So what happens if you only have old medical records when you apply for Social Security disability or apply for Supplemental Security Income disability?

A disability examiner will evaluate your medical records to see if there is anything current to address your disabling conditions. If you have nothing current, the disability examiner will schedule a consultative examination (examinations performed by medical professionals who are paid by Social Security) to address your disabling condition or conditions. If your disability claim involves both mental and physical impairments, you may have to attend more than one consultative examination before a decision can be made.

Consultative examinations are often a hurried affair with very little interaction between the medical professional and disability applicant. As an examiner I received many complaints from claimants that the examination was too short and not thorough. In fact, many applicants felt they were not even examined. Frankly, it seems these examinations are often just a way for Social Security to make their medical determination (i.e. for a disability examiner to have what is technically required to get a case closed and get it off his or her desk) and not necessarily a true evaluation of an individual's disabling condition.

Nonetheless, if you are scheduled for a social security medical exam --

A) Make sure that you attend the appointment,

B) Be truthful about your limitations, and

C) Give your best effort.

It really does not matter what anyone thinks about the legitimacy of consultative examinations because, the truth is, you have to attend the examination. If you do not attend or do not reschedule the consultative examination (which can happen if the appointment time is not convenient for you), your disability claim may be denied on this basis.

Things to keep in mind if you have to go to a consultative exam, or CE:

1) When you go to your consultative examination, remember you are being observed from the moment the doctor enters the examination room (I once read a consultative exam report that mentioned what a disability applicant did when he got out of his vehicle in the parking lot -- obviously, this doctor did not confine his observations to those that could be made inside his examination room).

2) Do not overstate or understate the effect your disabling condition has upon your daily life including work activity.

By giving a truthful portrayal of your limitations, you will not be labeled a malingerer (faker), a label that can be devastating to your chances of winning disability benefits.





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Social Security Disability Secrets

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Before you apply for social security disability... (consider these things)

Before you apply for social security disability... consider these things.

1. Though thirty percent of all claims filed for social security disability and SSI disability are approved at the initial claim level, that means that 70% are not.

2. Just because the social security office claims representative (or CR, for short) tells you that your disability application should be decided within 120 days does not mean that your case will be approved. It may fall into the seventy percent of cases that are denied.

3. If you decide to file a disability appeal following a denial on your claim, keep in mind that an even greater percentage of claims get denied on the request for reconsideration. And getting a decision on the reconsideration could also take months.

4. Getting denied on your initial disability application will typically mean that you will have to file the second appeal, a request for a disability hearing (since, as we said, most reconsideration appeals get denied, this makes the filing of a hearing request necessary in most instances).

If you've read the principal portions of the site, Disabilitysecrets.com, you may be aware of these facts. However, a notable percentage of individuals who file for disability labor under a dangerous assumption: that their claim will be "over" in just a number of weeks and that their disability benefits will commence thereafter. Yes, this does happen in a percentage of cases.

However, assuming that your disability claim will be processed and approved in a period of 120 days can be unwise, particularly if you are basing your personal financial decisions on this assumption.

Much in the same way, many potential claimants for social security disability and SSI put off the decision to actually file a claim simply because they have no idea that the claim process can easily take many many months. Many of these individuals are later shocked to learn that assistance from the federal disability system may not be forthcoming so soon, or so easily.

While we're at it, however, applicants for disability should also consider the following:

1. If you do get denied, get the appeal filed immediately, or have your disability representative (an attorney or non-attorney rep) do it for you. Waiting till the end of the 60 day deadline only serves to throw away valuable time on your case.

2. If you get denied, consider getting representation. As was mentioned, if you get denied on your initial claim, the likelihood is high that you will also be denied on your first appeal, the reconsideration, and will need to file for the second appeal, the hearing request. Hearings, of course, are best prepared for if you are represented.





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Social Security Disability Secrets

Social Security Disability Benefit Questions



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