What is usually the status of your social security disability or SSI case?

How to prove you are disabled
and win disability benefits

If you call to get the status of your disability claim, nine times out of ten you will be told that your claim is still pending. What does this mean? Simply that your case is still being worked on (wherever it happens to be, which could, depending on the level your claim is, be the hearing office or with a disability examiner at disability determination services).

On this page, I'll answer a few basic questions regarding the status of a social security disability or SSI claim. First of all,

1. How often should you call to get the status of your claim? Frankly, you probably shouldn't need to do this very often. That's because claim processing can take quite a while. It's not uncommon for a disability application to be in processing for six months or longer.

The same holds true for reconsideration appeals. And if your case is at the hearing level, either waiting for a hearing to be scheduled, or waiting for a decision to be made following a hearing, the wait could be much longer.

Having said that, though, it is not a bad idea to call every 90 days or so to check the status of your claim. By doing this, you can avoid the unenviable situation in which a decision has been made and you were not aware of that fact, thus losing the opportunity to file an appeal.

Of course, if you have representation in the form of a disability attorney or a disability representative, that individual or firm should be able to quite easily obtain the current status of your claim at any given time should you request it.

2. If you call to obtain the status of your disability claim and you are told that a decision has been made, will you be told what that decision was? No, as a disability examiner, I was acutely aware of the fact that even if a decision had been made on a case, this information could not be passed on to an inquiring claimant over the phone.

From the social security administration's standpoint, the only proper way to notify the claimant was through the written notice that is mailed out. Why is this the case? Because some claims are selected for a quality control review at something called DQB (the disability quality branch).

At DQB, a claim that has been pulled for review can potentially be changed. In other words, an approval can be changed to a denial, and a denial can be changed to an approval (though it is usually the other way around). When this happens, it is because DQB reviewed the decision made by the disability examiner and found that the examiner was in error, in the application of a medical-vocational rule, or in the interpretation of the claimant's medical evidence.

continued at: Where do you call to get the status of your Social Security Disability or SSI Claim?

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SSD and SSI are Federal Programs

The title II Social Security Disability and title 16 SSI Disability programs operate under federal guidelines and, therefore, the program requirements--medical and non-medical--apply to all states:

Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming

Recent approval and denial statistics for various states can be viewed here:

Social Security Disability, SSI Approval and Denial Statistics by state

Special Section: Disability Lawyers and unnecessary claim denials