Dire Need

According to Social Security, a dire need situation exists when a claimant alleges any of the following circumstances:

• The claimant is without food and is unable to obtain it.
• The claimant lacks medicine or medical care and is unable to obtain it, or access to necessary medical care is restricted because of a lack of resources.
• The claimant lacks shelter (e.g., without utilities such that their home is uninhabitable, homelessness, expiration of a shelter stay, or imminent eviction or foreclosure with no means to remedy the situation or obtain shelter).

Absent evidence to the contrary, accept a person's allegation that the person does not have enough income or resources to meet an immediate threat to their health or safety.  HO employees will err on the side of designating the case critical.

Despite the above, many requests to have a claim classified as a dire need case are ignored by the assigned analyst.

We represent a 58 year old with multiple foot, spine and wrist problems from Valley Stream who worked as an electrician.  We were able to obtain strong evidence from the claimant’s pain management specialist.  The claimant qualified as a dire need case because his utilities were being shut off.  However, the case was languishing because the analyst was holding dire need status hostage.

The analyst refused to tag the case as a dire need because he wanted to the claimant to attend a consultative examination (“CE”) with IMA. We had to escalate the matter above the analyst’s head, who claimed there was nothing he could do.  We succeeded in getting the supervisor to expedite the case, which was approved in about 10 days, without the need for a CE.

The claimant is so happy that he retained us, and that we had the experience and knowledge to do what was needed to get his claim expedited.   This is just another of many reasons why you should retain an experienced disability attorney to represent you if you plan on filing for Social Security Disability benefits.   If we hadn't known what to do, our claimant's case would still be sitting there.

If you are planning on applying for Social Security Disability benefits, please call our office for a free phone consultation at (888) 572-0861.  Our offices are conveniently located in Nassau and Suffolk counties on Long Island.

 

DDS Laziness

We represent a 49 year old financial advisor from Plainview with residual problems from a stroke, whose Social Security Disability (“SSD”) benefits were approved today without a hearing, but with little help from the State agency. 

Since the claimant was under 50 years of age, there was little need for vocational information, because transferable skills were not an issue. Nonetheless, the State agency repeatedly held the claim up by requesting more details about the claimant’s work duties than they do in other cases. 

To compound matters further, we submitted thousands of pages of medical and hospital records detailing the stroke sequelae. The records documented hemiparalysis, balance issues, fatigue, foot drop, among other things. Nonetheless, the State agency kept sending requests for the claimant’s brain scans – which we confirmed each time had already been submitted. Then it became obvious to us what the problem was. 

We went through the records that were in the State agency’s electronic folder for the claimant. We pulled out the brain scans, and resubmitted a second time. SSD benefits were approved shortly thereafter. In other words, the State Agency representative refused to review the medical records because they were so voluminous, so we had to do their job for them. 

It is vital to have an experienced disability attorney represent you if you plan on applying for SSD benefits. From the moment we file our client’s application, we stay on top of the representative(s) handling your claim. For example, when we submit medical evidence directly into our client’s efile, we receive a confirmatory receipt. However, we consistently find that when we check the efile a few days later, the evidence we submitted is not there. The State agency analysts' stock answer is that it’s the “system’s” fault. It’s a constant game of submitting evidence, checking to make sure it shows up in our claimant’s file, and then calling the State agency when we don’t find the evidence in the file. 

The bottom line is that most of the analysts at the State agency do not do their jobs. It could be that they are lazy, stupid or they just don’t care. If you want to maximize your chances of being approved for SSD benefits, then you need to retain an experienced disability attorney. We have been handling disability claims since the last Century. Please call our office for a free phone consultation if you plan on applying for SSD benefits. We have offices located in both Nassau and Suffolk counties on Long Island.