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| Allsup President and CEO Jim Allsup |
Allsup is having problems. Allsup, based near St. Louis, is a major non-attorney entity representing Social Security claimants. It started out representing disability claimants on behalf of insurance companies whose long tern disability (LTD) policies had an offset for Social Security disability benefits. In more recent years, Allsup has been trying to attract Social Security disability claimants one by one for representation. Allsup laid off 65 employees last August. In January of this year, they reduced the number of hours some of its employees work.The company has now laid off another 90 of its 600 employees.
Any idea as to why Allsup's having such a tough time? Disability law is a booming area right now. There's no shortage of claimants.
ReplyDeleteI would not call disability law "booming." With the new crop of ALJ's in the last few years, reduced backlogs, more initial approvals etc, it is not as lucrative of a practice it was 6-10 years ago.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, most of these LTD cases that get referred to Allsup are essentially slam dunk cases or layups.
Nevertheless, it brings up the question of why these non-attorney outfits are even allowed to exist. In the case of Allsup, they work in conjunction with the insurance company and the claimant. The client does not come first. As a result, it is a conflict of interest for such an arrangement to occur. Thus, they cannot hire active attorneys because they would be engaging in ethical violations.
@ 10:01 AM I would concur that disability isn't a "booming" practice anymore, particularly if a person is accustomed to succeeding by winning the low hanging hurt cases. Even what one would typically consider as "slam dunk" cases now take actual legal work and argument, something these outfits, and a lot of others who previously got rich doing disability cases aren't used to or equipped to do.
ReplyDeleteIf you have actual skill and knowledge, and are willing to work hard, disability can still be a viable area of practice. But with the new ALJ corps that has been put in place over the past several years, it is becoming harder and harder to do. I am hopeful that this will result in a thinning of the herd as far as representatives go.
Unlimited advertising, non-attorney reps, out of state attorneys, etc. are all factors in this practice. I have practiced Social Security Disability Law since 1979. At that time attorneys in my state did not want to handle these cases. For a number of years I was the only attorney in a metropolitan area of over 1 million that handled SSD cases. Now, there are hoards of attorneys advertising on tv, the internet, billboards next to the Social Security Office, etc. I refuse to advertise and I have less work. I am however, working as many days and hours as I did 20 years ago. I am also making less. I believe that the Social Security Administration allowed non-attorney reps at the beginning because attorneys were not interested in this field. That is not true now. I would be in favor of representation by attorneys only.
ReplyDeleteI am a supervisor at national SSD firm (not Binder). We are scrutinizing the claimants we take much more closely than ever before. I believe it is due to the new influx of tougher ALJs.
ReplyDeleteIt used to be a new ALJ started off granting more cases and then scaled back. Now, they seemed to be trained to deny most off the bat. Maybe that is a good thing. Not sure.
About non-attorney reps (NARs). A few years ago (around 2011), the SSA eliminated any more new NARs. I believe they started it again but not sure. Our firm will never use NARs (although I have seen some good ones especially those who went to law school and could not pass a bar).
Feel for anybody getting laid off. I am sure most of them at ALlsup needed this job. Shout out to those laid off at Allsup.
As a local attorney, I'm always happy when national and large regional disability firms do badly.
ReplyDeleteI look forward to the day when local practitioners learn to compete with their national advertising and drive most of these carpetbaggers out of business.
In my humble opinion...
Nice to see your compassionate side, Mr. Humble at 3:37 PM. If you read other articles on this story, you'll see that many of these layoffs were on the Medicare side of their business. So national firms are "carpetbaggers". I guess you never shop at Walmart, Target, Home Depot or Lowes because they are evil national stores. Enjoy the mom and pop hardware and convenient stores.
ReplyDeleteSocial Security is not eliminating new NARs. In fact, there is a NAR test scheduled in May 2014. The national ads and internet advertising is somewhat deceptive. I have had at least two clients who thought they were filing for SSD on-line only to find that they had hired a national disability firm. I have taken over a number of cases started by the national disability firms. So far, I am not impressed by the work they did. Maybe it is a sign of the times but why would anyone want to hire an attorney or NAR that is 1,000 or more miles from home when there are competent, reputable attorneys several miles away?
ReplyDeleteCash Flow has been very difficult for about the last year and this year has been extremely slow. It is reflected in the national pay statistics with numbers of cases and amounts paid to reps about where it was five or six years ago. All this despite increasing caseloads at SS and especially at ODAR from close to 700,00 to what appears to be moving up to 900,000 cases waiting. It is most pronounced in the are of average case processing now over 400 days at ODAR alone and waits of three months or more to get decisions out once the cases are heard.
ReplyDeleteWhile this is a problem for small and local firms, and bringing tough times to many, most will weather the storm. For the mega national firms, or national firm wannabes, with large numbers of staff and large advertising budgets, it has been a disaster. All of these firms seem to be in trouble and Allsup is just another example. As to those that advertise heavily but are in reality just referral engines with little staff, who knows.
allsup is actually a pretty good firm....could i please get some massive layoffs at binder or lavan and neidenburg?
ReplyDeleteThere are massive layoffs at Binder. Just this past week in California, I heard they let go 2/3 of their case managers and many of their attorneys and NARS. They are severely scaling back.
ReplyDeleteThere are no employees to lay off at LaVan and Neidenberg...
ReplyDelete