Excuses Excuses

By Susan Golden

The number one question we get everyday is, "How long will it take to get a decision on my claim?"  The answer is, "Be prepared for the long haul."  Why is that?  As soon as we file a social security disability ("SSD") claim with our client's local Social Security Administration ("SSA") office, the excuses and delays begin.  Popular excuses from the local offices include: "We don't have all the paperwork;" "The file must be sitting on someone's desk;" "We're backlogged;" "The person handling the case is out;" and "We don't know why it hasn't been processed yet, everything we need is here!"

After your local SSA office processes the claim, they send it to the State agency, where the claim is reviewed.  Everything is done electronically, so the file should be transferred quickly to the State agency, and include everything submitted to the Local SSA office, such as your application and our letters of representation.  However, depending on the local office, it can take weeks, sometimes months, to get the file transferred, and even then, the State agency claims documents are  missing.

Your file has been transferred to the State agency!  Great, now things will start moving.  Hold on, let's not get ahead of ourselves.  The State agency is full of their own excuses and delay tactics.  In fact, they are masters at it.  They constantly complain that they don't have enough information from the claimant's treating doctors, even though we have submitted exactly what they are asking for!  They mislabel documents in the file, and are too lazy to look through them, because if they did, then they would realize that the file does indeed have exactly what they are asking for.   They don't look at a file for months, and then all of a sudden they complain the records we have submitted are "stale," when we had submitted them in a timely manner.  Luckily, we know how to play their game, and call them out on their delay tactics.

I could go on and on, but don't have enough space or time, but you get the picture.  If you need to apply for SSD, you should make certain that you retain an experienced disability attorney.  We have over three decades of experience, and know the SSA system inside and out.  Please feel free to call our office for a free phone consultation.  We have offices in Nassau and Suffolk counties on Long Island.