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The Social Security Administration just published current statistics regarding the workload of the hearing offices around the country, including the Portland, Maine hearing office. 

The Workload Data Report shows the Portland ODAR received 976 appealed claims in Fiscal Year 2010, disposed of 771 claims, and has 2,989 pending claims as of December 2009. That is a lot of pending claims. The current average processsing time is 320 days.

The NETSTAT Report shows "the average time (in months) from the hearing request date until a hearing is held for claims pending in the Office of Disability Adjudication and Review's hearing offices. Allows users to estimate the amount of time they may have to wait for a hearing to be held." A claimant should expect to wait 11 months for a hearing in Portland, Maine.

The SSA has just released, and posted on its website, a goldmine of current statistics regarding the Social Security hearing offices (ODARs) and judges.

Check out the ALJ Disposition Data. These Fiscal Year 2010 statistics, which run through December 2009, are the most current available. Notably, the data includes the disposition statistics for new ALJs who have been under the radar until now. The list is alphabetical by judge. Just scroll down to find the ALJ you seek.

Here is a sampling of the notable posts from the Social Security disability blogs:

The latest statistics for average processing times for the Social Security hearing offices just arrived. The average processing time for the Portland, Maine hearing office stands at 327 days – just about 11 months. 

Processing time runs from the day the hearing office receives your hearing request to the day a decision is issued. The 327 days is an average. Some claims are resolved more quickly. A claim that goes to hearing and a written decision is likely to take longer.

In New Hampshire, the Manchester hearing office has an average processing time of 421 days – about 14 months. While this is 94 days longer than in Maine, New Hampshire is a prototype state that skips the Reconsideration step. Since months are not being lost in New Hampshire waiting for Reconsideration, claims are actually moving from initial denial to hearing more quickly than in Maine (where 4-5 months are lost at the Reconsideration step of the process).

Back from its holiday hiatus, the Roundup returns! Here are some of the notable recent posts from the Social Security disability blogs:

Going forward, the Disability Blog Roundup will appear here every other Friday.

The substantial gainful activity (SGA) amount for 2010 is $1,000 per month. You can see the SGA amounts since 1975 here.

The SGA determination is step 1 of Social Security's 5-step sequential evaluation. For Social Security disability or SSI, you must have (or expect to have) a 12-month period during which you do not have earnings at the SGA level.

If you are an employee earning more than $1,000 per month, you are probably not eligible for Social Security disability benefits. See 20 C.F.R. 404.1574. I say probably not, because other factors are considered, including IRWEs and UWAs. 

If you are self-employed, the test for SGA is a more complicated. See 20 C.F.R. 404.1575.

If you have a disability claim pending with the Social Security Administration, please make the following New Year's resolution: 

    I will appeal my claim immediately if it is denied.

Although you have 60 days to appeal a denied claim, there is no reason to wait. I speak with people almost every week who did not appeal their denied claims within 60 days, and then had to start over by reapplying for Social Security disability benefits.

If you receive a denial letter in the mail, it is a good time to talk with a disability lawyer about your options. But please be sure to appeal that denial right away. 

It is always a pleasure to call a client with the news that his or her Social Security disability claim has been granted at the hearing level with an on the record (OTR) decision. 

With the claim granted, there is no further wait for a hearing, and the inevitable stress from worrying about the outcome of the claim comes to an end. It is welcome news.

It is even better to make that call just before Christmas. I just made one such phone call, and it really does put you in the Christmas spirit.

Social Security has an odd, two-tiered system for disability claims. The initial and reconsideration claims are decided by Disability Determination Services (DDS), a state agency. For denied claims that are appealed to the hearing level (and you should always appeal your denial), the claim goes to a Social Security hearing office, which is actually operated by the the SSA. At the hearing level, your claim is evaluated by staff attorneys and ultimately decided by a U.S. Administrative Law Judge. 

Nationally, the majority of claims that reach the hearing level are granted. This raises the obvious question: Why were they denied by DDS in the first place?

Sometimes there is new evidence by the time a claim gets a hearing. But often, there was no logical reason for the initial DDS denial. 

Tim Moore, a former disability examiner, wrote about this disconnect between the state DDS agencies and the federal Social Security hearing offices recently on his blog. Here is an excerpt:

if a claim that was denied twice by a disability examiner (initial claim and reconsideration levels) is later approved by a judge, what was the point? 

More specifically, what was the point of so needlessly wasting so much agency time and money, otherwise known as taxpayer dollars, in this fashion. 

And, further, what was the point of forcing so many tens of thousands of individuals who were initially denied but were likely to get approved later at a hearing into a needlessly drawn out wait often resulting in bankruptcy and home foreclosure?

Answer: there was no point.

Read his entire post, entitled Social Security Disability Problems.

It is frustrating to have disability claims that you know will be granted at the hearing level denied by DDS. And it is difficult to reassure clients that these DDS denials can be turned around. It is unfortunate that we are asking the question: Is the DDS system broken?