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What's Going On With Your SSDI Case?

21 June 2019

Cassandra Stone

The road to Social Security benefits can be lengthy and worrisome. If you cannot work because of your injuries, you are likely counting on the financial help Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits could bring. After you've submitted your application, it can feel like it's dropped into a black hole. Read on for some tips on what's going on with your SSDI application as it makes its way through the system.

Checking Your Work Credits

Your paychecks have been paying for the right to draw SSDI payments all along. The way the Social Security Administration (SSA) computes your ability to qualify for benefits is through work credits. You must show, through work credits, that you have earned enough money during a certain period of time prior to your applying for benefits. If you meet the criteria, you move on to an evaluation of your substantial gainful activity (SGA).

Evaluating Your SGA

Substantial gainful activity refers to your ability to be paid from working. To qualify for benefits, you must show that you are unable to perform SGA. That means you cannot still be working at your job or at any job when you apply for benefits. In fact, you must be unable to work at any job for a full year. That year can be in the past, in the future or any combination of those. If you pass this section, your case moves forward to the most time-consuming part of the approval process: Disability Determination Services (DDS).

Disability Determination Evaluation

This is the toughest part of the process for many and where they often end up getting denied. You must be able to show, through the information on your application and from medical records, that you have a covered disability and that it meets all of the conditions required. Additionally, if you are shown to have the disability and have back up from doctors, the DDS will determine whether or not that affliction should prevent you from working at your job (or other jobs). Here are a few areas where applicants get tripped up:

1. They don't have a good pattern of seeking treatment. Make sure you don't have gaps in treatment and you follow the doctor's orders, take the medicine, and have needed diagnostic tests. Continue with treatment after applying for SSD.
2. They cannot prove that they have the disorder because they never received treatment.
3. They don't have a covered illness. Not all afflictions are covered.
4. They have an affliction but it's not severe enough.

You might end up being one of those people who are denied but don't give up. Speak to a Social Security Disability attorney about help with your appeal.

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