Social Security Removes Wet Signature Requirements For Many Forms

     The Social Security Administration ("SSA") is trying to ease the burden on claimants trying to access benefits by reducing the number of forms that require a wet signature.  So far, SSA is allowing digital signatures on 30 forms. Most notably, SSA is allowing claimants to digitally sign the Authorization to Disclose Information to SSA form (aka as the SSA-827 form), a commonly used form that is required several times throughout the Social Security Disability Insurance ("SSDI") and Supplemental Security Income ("SSI") application and appeal processes. 

For more information on SSA's digitalization improvements, check out SSA's press release from yesterday: 
https://www.ssa.gov/news/press/releases/2024/#2024-09-05

    Got a question about SSDI or SSI that you need us to answer? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with helpful information on our website that will allow you to successfully navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to email me your questions at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call me at (800) 459-3017 x 101.

The Social Security Administrations Announces 9 New Compassionate Allowances Conditions For 2024

 The Social Security Administration (“SSA”) added 9 new conditions to the Compassionate Allowances program.  SSA also revised two conditions that were already on the Compassionate Allowances list. This brings the total number of conditions on the list to 287. Disabilities that comprise the Compassionate Allowance list represent the most serious disabilities that affect individuals. The purpose of the program is to expedite disability decisions, so individuals suffering from these severe diseases receive their benefit decisions as quick as possible. More than one million people with life-threatening disabilities have received their benefits through this expedited process.  The new additions include:

1.      Bainbridge-Ropers Syndrome

2.      Costello Syndrome

3.      Adult Heart Transplant Wait List - Status Levels 1-4

4.      Child Heart Transplant Wait List - Status Levels 1A/1B (revised existing condition)

5.      Histiocytic Malignancies

6.      Histiocytosis Syndromes (revised existing condition)

7.      Neonatal Marfan Syndrome

8.      PACS1 Syndrome

9.      Plasmablastic Lymphoma

10.  Renal Medullary Carcinoma

11.  Snijders Blok-Campeau Syndrome

To see a complete list of all the impairments which qualify for the Compassionate Allowances program, visit this website: https://www.ssa.gov/compassionateallowances/conditions.htm/.

Got a question that you need answered? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with valuable information on our website that may help you navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to shoot us an email at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call us at (800) 459-3017.

Crowdstrike Strikes the Social Security Administration

Just an FYI - folks! If you were planning on heading to your local Social Security Administration ("SSA") office or calling your local SSA office today to check the status of your application or appeal, wait until next week. The global Microsoft and Crowdstrike outage problems that were responsible for canceling  numerous flights and elective surgeries have also caused SSA to close today. SSA claimed that while their offices were closed, you could still call in and get your questions answered, but I am finding it impossible to get through any of their phone lines. Let's hope this one-day outage doesn't lead SSA to fall further behind in processing claims. 

Got a question about SSDI or SSI that you need us to answer? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with helpful information on our website that will allow you to successfully navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to email me your questions at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call me at (800) 459-3017 x 101.

Archaic Asset Limitations for the Supplemental Security Income ("SSI") Program Continues to Create Issues for Vulnerable Americans

Here is some excellent reporting by National Public Radio's, Mr. Joseph Shapiro, regarding the pitfalls of the Supplemental Security Income ("SSI") program:

https://www.npr.org/2024/06/08/g-s1-3475/social-security-ssi-asset-limits

We hear these stories all the time. The SSI program is archaic and incomprehensible, so please make sure you educate yourself as to the resource limits when it comes to SSI. Even going $5 over the 2K resource level, for an individual, and 3K level, for a couple, will get your SSI benefits cutoff. You may also get saddled with an overpayment. 

Some of the resources that the Social Security Administration ("SSA") looks at are:

Bank Accounts;
Burial funds (in certain instances);
Cash;
Deemed Resources;
Land;
Life Insurance; 
Personal Property;
Retirement Accounts;
Stocks, bonds, CDs, mutual funds;
Anything else you own which could be changed to cash and used for food and shelter.

Vehicles; and

For more information on how SSA looks at SSI resources, visit SSA's resource page at: https://www.ssa.gov/ssi/text-resources-ussi.htm

Got a question about SSDI or SSI that you need us to answer? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with helpful information on our website that will allow you to successfully navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to email me your questions at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call me at (800) 459-3017 x 101.

The Social Security Administration Announces the Top Baby Names for 2023

Did you name a baby Liam or Olivia in 2023? If so, you are in good company. The Social Security Administration announced that Liam was the top male name, while Olivia was the top female name for 2023.

Here is the list of top 10 names for baby boys and  girls for 2023.

Male names:

1. Liam

2. Noah

3. Oliver

4. James

5. Elijah

6 Mateo

7. Theodore

8. Henry 

9. Lucas

10. William

Female Names:

1. Olivia

2. Emma

3. Charlotte

4. Amelia

5. Sophia

6. Mia

7. Isabella

8. Ava

9. Evelyn

10. Luna

All of these make sense to me with the exception of Luna. Do not get me wrong...it is a lovely name, but I have never met a human named Luna. I have known a plethora of cats and dogs named Luna, but I have never met a human child named Luna. I must be wrong because Luna was the tenth most popular name for girls.

Got a question about SSDI or SSI that you need us to answer? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with helpful information on our website that will allow you to successfully navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to email me your questions at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call me at (800) 459-3017 x 101.

The Social Security Administration Announces Changes To How They Assess Past Relevant Work

The Social Security Administration (SSA”) announced welcomed news that they are changing how they assess past relevant work (“PRW”) when it comes to Social Security Disability Insurance (“SSDI”) and Supplemental Security Income (“SSI”) claims. Currently, PRW is work that a claimant has performed over the last 15 years. However, starting on June 8, 2024, SSA will only consider work performed in the last five years to be PRW.

 Why is this important to disability assessments? Current law states that you cannot be found disabled if your disability doesn’t prevent you from performing any job that you held over the last 15 years, or if disability doesn’t prevent you from performing any job that you have held over the last 15 years that you have transferrable skills to. There are exceptions. For instance, if a claimant performed a job for less than 30 days, it generally cannot be counted against the claimant. This is because it is likely that an individual who performed a job for less than 30 days wasn’t at the job long enough to learn the job.

However, if an individual was at the job long enough to learn the skillset required to perform the job requirements, and the work was performed in the last 15 years, SSA will consider that job to be PRW.

 This has been a problematic way to categorize work because rapid changes in technology have made jobs performed today radically different than jobs performed 15 years ago. Take for example the teaching industry. While computers were naturally prevalent in the classroom 15 years ago, platforms like Zoom and Microsoft Teams were not. Teachers of today contend with a variety of options to conduct their classes by. They can hold classes or office hours virtually. They can break courses into online modules for students to learn at their own pace. Teachers must be aware of technology that students are using to cut corners like utilizing artificial intelligence to write papers. These were not issues that teachers from 15 years ago had to address. Modern day teachers must be much more technologically savvy than the teachers from 15 years ago.

 I recognize this sounds like a lot of mumbo jumbo but let me give you a real-life example. I had a client who had been a painter for the last 15 years. He is in his late 50’s and had a cervical fusion which prevented him from returning to his painting position. The problem was that this client had worked as a telemarketer 13 years ago. His cervical injury did not necessarily prevent him from performing his telemarketing job. The telemarketing industry may have changed substantially over the last 15 years, but my client’s former position as a telemarketer was a job that SSA could consider as a potential position that my client could perform now despite his cervical fusion. SSA’s decision to change PRW to a 5-year window would have helped my client establish that he could not work.

 Keep in mind that changing the PRW categorization from 15 to five years does not help claimants under the age of 50. If you are under 50, SSA will not consider you disabled if you could perform any work in the nationally economy despite your physical or mental disability. SSA does keep in mind an individual’s skill level and education when assessing one’s ability to work. SSA won’t say that a person with an 8^th grade education can be a doctor, but if you are under the age of 50 and have the physical and mental ability to perform an unskilled job, then SSA expects you to work.

SSA only starts looking at transferable skills when a claimant is over the age of 50. This is because the older we get, the harder it can be to adjust to other work. Also, the government doesn’t expect that someone in their late 50’s who held a sedentary position for most of her life would adapt to a heavier job, like one found in the construction industry.

Got a question about SSDI or SSI that you need us to answer? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with helpful information on our website that will allow you to successfully navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to email me your questions at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call me at (800) 459-3017 x 101.

Commissioner O’Malley Takes on The Social Security Administration’s Overpayment Crisis

 The Social Security Administration’s (“SSA’s”) Commissioner, Martin O’ Malley, has announced a plan to attack the overpayment crisis. Commissioner O’Malley is leading SSA by taking 4 key steps to prevent the severe injustices that beneficiaries have faced for decades when SSA makes accounting errors.   

 Starting Monday, March 25, 2024, SSA will drastically change the overpayment recovery process with these four major changes:

1.       SSA will no longer take 100 percent of a claimant’s monthly Social Security benefit by default if a beneficiary fails to respond to an overpayment reimbursement request. Instead, SSA will only withhold 10 percent of the monthly benefit to satisfy the debt, making the repayment process like the repayment process used when it comes to the Supplemental Security Income program.

2.       SSA no longer will put the burden on the beneficiary to prove the beneficiary was not at fault when it comes to the overpayment. I am assuming this means SSA will have to prove fault.

3.       SSA will allow a beneficiary 60 months, opposed to 36 months, to repay an overpayment, if the beneficiary provides a verbal summary of their income, resources and expenses. Means-tested SSI recipients do not need to even provide a verbal summary to get the additional two years to repay benefits.

If you have ever dealt with SSA before, you know that this third step will NEVER work. SSA will simply claim that the beneficiary never verbally notified them of the desire to have a 60-month repayment plan. I highly recommend that you send in your request for 60 months by BOTH certified mail and by fax, so you have two receipts. Otherwise, SSA may (and by may…I mean will) claim you never contacted them. SSA always says they hate duplicates…..well I hate my weekly calls with them when they claim they never received paperwork that we submitted to them on multiple occasions. Protect yourself and make sure you have written proof that you requested a 60 month repayment plan and that your local office received said request.  

4.       Commissioner O’Malley also promised that SSA will make it easier for beneficiaries to request a waiver if they believe they were not at fault for the overpayment. No additional details were offered of how SSA plans to do this, but given Commissioner O’Malley fondness for technology, I assume that beneficiaries will be able to complete a waiver form online. If SSA is truly trying to make waiver forms accessible, online waiver submissions would be a must.

The press release is certainly promising, but I am a strong believer that actions speak louder than press releases. Let’s see where we are in a year and if there has been progress in the overpayment situation.

Now Commissioner O’Malley, what are you going to do to fix the atrocious consultative examiner (“CE”) process? That is by far the biggest issue that SSA must fix for the disability process to have any legitimacy. I wish fixing the corrupted CE system was his first order of business, but tackling overpayments is a good start.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Got a question that you need answered? Please check out our website at www.westcoastdisability.com . We try to provide you with valuable information on our website that may help you navigate the Social Security Disability process. Also, feel free to shoot me an email at megan@westcoastdisability.com or call us at (800) 459-3017 x 101.