I am still wading through Social Security's Notice of Proposed Rule-Making (NPRM) on the representation of claimants. I see many problems. Here is my second installment on this subject.
The proposal would make direct deposit of fees for representing claimants mandatory. Most attorneys I know would be delighted to receive their fees by direct deposit, except for one problem. How would they know which direct deposit goes with which client? The Department of the Treasury is not sending enough information with direct deposits to allow identification of the client involved. This is already a pain when we deal with payments under the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), but we receive far fewer of those checks. The current maximum fee, after deduction of the user fee is $5,221. If I receive a direct deposit for $5,221 I have no idea what client the fee is for. Social Security's response to this question to this point seems to have been "Uh, uh, uh, why don't you ask Treasury?" I find that attitude unhelpful.
Treasury is not the one proposing this regulation. I am not sure how much clout Social Security will have in getting Treasury to resolve this problem, but I am pretty sure that it is more clout than I and others who represent Social Security claimants will have with Treasury. Social Security needs to get this resolved before they make direct deposit of fees for representing claimants mandatory.
You may comment on this proposal online and I encourage you to do so. This is a major proposal. Everyone who represents Social Security claimants needs to be studying it carefully and submitting comments.
The proposal would make direct deposit of fees for representing claimants mandatory. Most attorneys I know would be delighted to receive their fees by direct deposit, except for one problem. How would they know which direct deposit goes with which client? The Department of the Treasury is not sending enough information with direct deposits to allow identification of the client involved. This is already a pain when we deal with payments under the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), but we receive far fewer of those checks. The current maximum fee, after deduction of the user fee is $5,221. If I receive a direct deposit for $5,221 I have no idea what client the fee is for. Social Security's response to this question to this point seems to have been "Uh, uh, uh, why don't you ask Treasury?" I find that attitude unhelpful.
Treasury is not the one proposing this regulation. I am not sure how much clout Social Security will have in getting Treasury to resolve this problem, but I am pretty sure that it is more clout than I and others who represent Social Security claimants will have with Treasury. Social Security needs to get this resolved before they make direct deposit of fees for representing claimants mandatory.
You may comment on this proposal online and I encourage you to do so. This is a major proposal. Everyone who represents Social Security claimants needs to be studying it carefully and submitting comments.
5 comments:
We've read all too often about the future trouble social security is in. Considering the current economic mess, how much worse off is social security today? And we have another problem looming - long term care, that no one is talking about.
In addition to your direct deposit you should recieve a copy of the letter sent to the claimant when attorney fees are being released, that is part of the rule SSA technitians follow, each disbursment of funds must be followed by a notice.
It happens more often than not, however, that the Atty Rep never does receive a copy of the Notice of Award. I have several cases in which one day a check showed up but never ever received a Notice of Award. At least in that scenario I can identify who the check relates to and then work on obtaining the Notice of Award (which is another nightmare) from the PC or the FO. But like Charles said, if it is a direct deposit with no identifying information and I never do get the Notice of Award, how am I to tie the fee to the claimant?
Because, again, of the shortage of staff, there is no time in many cases to make sure that a notice went out, either automated or manual. Just another thing, among many, that goes undone in the FO's.
Somehow our office manager is able to ascertain which claimant corresponds to eac direct deposit made in our company's bank account. I'm not sure how she does it, but there is sufficient information provided for her to be able to do so. She doesn't even have the notices of award -- our case managers have those in their files.
We have a large practice with several locations, so it's not like we're just waiting on a few payments at any given time.
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