- Welcome to the Hill & Ponton Disability Blog.
I'm Natalia Jofre, our Social Security section director.
- And I am Shelly Mark.
I am our senior Social Security attorney.
- So, we wanted to talk to you today
about what happens if you're denied at the initial level,
which we talked about in our last blog,
and what your basic options are.
So, if you're approved, congratulations.
It is somewhat of a rarity because 85% of cases are denied.
But if you're denied, then you can file an appeal
and request what's called reconsideration,
and that will now basically put you at the second level
of the Social Security claims process.
So, in order to file an appeal,
you have to complete very specific forms.
You can get these online, you can submit your appeal online,
you can go into your local Social Security office
or you can mail in your appeal.
We recommend probably that you file it online
because it is the fastest way to submit your appeal
and cuts down on your wait time.
That's what we do for our clients.
If you go to your local Social Security office,
make sure you get there really early
or perhaps you can try and make an appointment.
If you mail your appeal,
we strongly recommend that you send it certified,
return receipt, so that way you have proof
that it was actually received
by the Social Security office because--
- They have a history of not receiving things
that are actually sent to them. (laughing)
- (laughing) Right, they lose things a lot.
And you don't want it to come down
to your word against theirs
because the only option's gonna be
for you to start all over again.
And you have 60 days to file an appeal,
plus five mailing days.
That sounds awkward, but it can come in very, very handy
because let's say you get your denial, you get sick,
and time sort of passes you by, you have a total of 65 days.
However, then you wanna make sure
that it's actually in their office within that time period
because it's technically 60.
So, once, go ahead.
- One thing that I don't know if you,
but I've noticed before is some of our clients
maybe aren't at a permanent address
while they're filing their disability claim.
And a lotta times at this point in their claim,
their correspondence may be sending to an address
that they're not at all the time,
and so they run into issues
where they're not getting the decisions in a timely manner
so that they can file an appeal.
So, just a point to remember, make sure whichever address
you're using with Social Security
is either your address or if it is a different address,
that it's somewhere that someone's gonna be notifying them
as soon as the documents come in.
- That's a really big deal.
So, if you're having your denials
or your mail in general sent to a relative's home
or a friend's home,
make sure that you're checking in with them frequently
because Social Security is not going to accept,
"My friend didn't tell me that I got this denial,"
as a reasonable explanation
for why you didn't file an appeal on time.
What they would accept would be something like
you were hospitalized and you couldn't,
you physically weren't able or you mentally weren't able,
if you were in a psychiatric facility.
Or if you were in a coma,
clearly, you couldn't file your own appeal.
But if it's basically,
"Well, my mom got it and she didn't tell me,"
or, "They were on vacation
"and when we got back the mailbox was full,"
I mean, none of that's gonna be a legitimate explanation
for them in order to file your appeal late.
So, I think, next we'll talk about
what you actually do and what actually happens
once you file that appeal and where it goes
and what you can expect to happen next in our next blog.
- That sounds great.
- All right, great.
Well, thanks for joining us.
If you have any questions, feel free to call our office
or visit our website.
- Thank you.
(light piano music)