Information about Video Hearings

With the exception of certain SSA bureaucrats who boast about efficiency, video hearings are universally unpopular. ALJs, experts, claimants, and Michigan Social Security disability lawyer all prefer the conventional hearing. Claimants especially feel video hearings are impersonal and would rather tell their stories to the ALJ in person.

Video Hearings

To encourage claimants to try video hearings, the SSA uses a brochure that discusses their. It explains that, “Except for the equipment, a video hearing is no different than a hearing at which you appear in person.”

Unfortunately, this video equipment is precisely what affects how the claimant and the ALJ interact. By speaking to a far-away person present only onscreen, the hearing becomes remote and distant. The only upside of a video hearing is that the claimant has a chance of getting the hearing faster.

Social Security regulations allow you to decline a video hearing and reschedule to a later hearing when you will be able to appear in person. Your Michigan Social Security disability lawyer can help you toward this end.

Refusing to Appear by Video

Social Security regulations allow the ALJ to find your wish not to appear by video teleconferencing as a viable reason for rescheduling the hearing for a later time and place at which you will be able to appear in person. Therefore, you essentially have veto power over any video appearance.

But your Michigan Social Security disability lawyer should caution you that such a privilege extends only to you. While your wish not to appear by video is a good enough reason to reschedule an in-person appearance, the Social Security regulation will not similarly honor an expert’s refusal to appear by video. The regulation also does not explain or provide examples of what would be a permissible cause for having an expert witness appear in person instead of via video. As a result, the ALJ will rarely allow an expert to decline a video appearance in order to appear in person.

If you are disabled and seeking SSD benefits, you will need legal assistance from an experienced Michigan Social Security disability lawyer. For immediate legal representation, please call J.B. Bieske and Jennifer Alfonsi, Attorneys at Law, today at 1-800-331-3530.