When you apply for Michigan Social Security Disability benefits, the federal Social Security Administration will use a five-step process to decide whether you are disabled and therefore qualify for help. Your application has to make it through the social security disability evaluation process before you can get the benefits you’ve asked for. With just a few exceptions, if the Social Security Administration decides at any step that you’re not disabled, then the process immediately stops and your claim will be denied.
Experienced Michigan SSD attorneys know how to avoid common mistakes that can cause your claim to fail the five-step ssd evaluation process. At our firm, SSD lawyers J.B. Bieske and Jennifer Alfonsi work especially hard to get clients’ claims approved the first time. Contact us if you have any questions about making your first step toward benefits the right one.
Here are the five steps the SSA will use when it decides whether you are “disabled” and therefore qualify for SSD benefits. They can be thought of as five questions the SSA will ask.
1. Are you currently doing any “substantial gainful activity”?
The Social Security Administration (SSA) first asks, in essence, if you are currently working. The way it decides if you are working is by asking whether you are engaged in what it calls “substantial gainful activity.”
So what does that mean? It most cases, it just means that the Social Security Administration will look at how much you actually earn every month. If you earn more than a certain amount, the agency does not consider you to be disabled. The amount changes every year. For 2014, you have to earn less than $1,070 per month. If you earn more than that, then the SSA will conclude you are engaging in a substantial gainful activity and you are not disabled. (The amount is $1,800 per month for blind persons).
2. Is your condition “severe”?
After deciding that you are not working at a substantial gainful activity, the SSA asks whether your condition is “severe.” That means you must have a real medical problem that a doctor can identify, and your condition must interfere with basic work-related activities. Those can include activities like walking, sitting, standing, and moving and carrying things. It also can include hearing, speaking, and seeing, and being able to interact with others at a workplace – like understanding instructions and directions about how to accomplish tasks.
In some cases, if you have more than one impairment, the combination of your conditions can qualify you as disabled, even if the impairments wouldn’t qualify you by themselves.
If the Social Security Administration concludes that you do not have a “severe” condition, then it will decide that you are not disabled, and you will not be awarded benefits.
3. Is your condition found in the SSA’s list of disabling conditions?
The Social Security Administration has a list of many medical conditions that it considers so severe that they automatically qualify as disabling. So if your condition is on the list, the SSA will find that you are disabled and qualify for SSD benefits. If it’s not, then the SSA has to decide whether your condition is as bad as a medical condition that does appear on the list. If so, then once again you will be found to be disabled and can get SSD benefits.
4. Can you do the work that you used to do?
The SSA next asks whether you can do the work that you used to do. To get to this point in the five-step process, you must have a “severe” condition that is not as bad as anything found in the SSA’s list of disabling conditions. The agency will then take a look at what sort of work you can still do, and if your condition interferes with the work you’ve done before, based on your past work history. If you can still do the work you used to do, according to the Social Security Administration, then your claim will be denied. But if your condition does interfere with your ability to do the work you once did, then the SSA goes to its final question in the five-step process.
5. Can you do any type of work?
Here the Social Security Administration asks if you can do any other type of work. Specifically, it considers whether you can adjust to other work, different from the work you used to do in the past. If the SSA thinks you can, based on your current abilities, age, education, work experience, and other work readily available in the job market, then your disability claim will be denied. Otherwise, you will be considered disabled and you will qualify for SSD benefits.
As you see, there’s a lot that goes into the SSA’s five-step process for evaluating SSD benefits claims. Having the guidance of an experienced and skilled Social Security Disability benefits attorney can make the difference in getting your claim approved or denied. If you have a valid SSD benefits claim, having your benefits application denied can mean months of delay and headaches before you receive your much-needed benefits.
Don’t risk having your Michigan Social Security Disability benefits claim denied because of a mistake on your application that you didn’t know how to avoid. Michigan SSD attorneys, J.B. Bieske and Jennifer Alfonsi, Attorneys at Law, have helped thousands of SSD benefits applicants get their disability benefits on their first application. They can help you, too.
We can answer your Michigan SSD benefits questions and explain how we can help you with your claim. All you need to do is contact us to schedule a free consultation. J.B. Bieske and Jennifer Alfonsi, Attorneys at Law, have convenient local offices throughout Southeastern Michigan – in Macomb Township, Livonia, Novi, Troy, Downriver, and Detroit. That makes it easy to visit with us in person, but if you can’t come by, just let us know and we’ll meet with you by phone.
Whether you’re in Farmington Hills, Ann Arbor, Lansing, Adrian, Jackson, Ypsilanti, Eaton Rapids, or anywhere else in Southeastern Michigan, simply call us at (800) 331-3530, or use our convenient online contact form, to schedule an appointment. We’ll discuss your claim, answer any questions you may have, and let you know how we can help.