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9. Always (repeat: always) keep copies of everything you ever submit to either the social security office, Disability Determination Services, or the Office of Hearings & Appeals. Though items generally get where they should after being mailed, some social security field and district offices are notorious for losing mail or claiming never to have received mail (The Durham, North Carolina District Office is exceptionally well-known for this).
10. Never presume that something you have mailed to either the social security office, disability determination services, or the office of hearings and appeals...actually arrived. In other words, several days after mailing documents (an application, appeal, medical records, etc), make a followup call to verify that the recipient agency actually received what was sent.
11. Prepare financially. Many, if not most, disability claimants do not realize how long the process may literally take. In the majority of instances, it may take as long as 2 years or more to win an approval (simply because most claimants will be denied at the initial and reconsideration levels and will then have to request, and wait for, a hearing to be scheduled).
Therefore, claimants should never rely on the time estimates offered by the social security offices where they have filed. Why? Because CR's (social security claims reps) do not process disability claims. They simply take disability applications, which are then forwarded to DDS and assigned to examiners. Once a case is at DDS, it may stay there for 30 days, or 230 days. There is simply no way to know how long a case will take to process (though a claimant can potentially speed up this process by assisting in the gathering of medical records).
With this in mind, then, claimants should be extremely careful regarding their finances. In fact, claimants with mortgages may wish to consider restructuring their debt load to "ride out" the disability process.
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DISABILITY ADVICE PAGE 1
DISABILITY ADVICE PAGE 2
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