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New Edition Of My Book Available

West Publishing has released the 2008 edition of my book, Social Security Disability Practice. You can take a look at the table of contents online.

Debit Cards

In case you were wondering what the new debit cards through which Social Security beneficiaries can receive their benefits look like, here you go.

Updated Fee Payment Stats

The Social Security Administration has posted updated data on payments of fees to attorneys and others for representing Social Security claimants. Since the attorney and client are paid at about the same time, this is a useful analog for speedups and slowdowns in benefit payments to claimants. You can certainly see evidence in these numbers that these payments are far from steady.

Payment delays are tough for claimants. The ups and downs also make for a stomach churning ride for those who represent claimants. If you work at Social Security and have ever thought about leaving to represent Social Security claimants, take a close look at these numbers before giving up that regular paycheck. This is one of the reasons that very few Social Security Administration employees leave the agency to represent claimants.

Fee Payments
Month/Year	Volume	Amount
Jan-08	20,559	$75,368,163.45
Feb-08	26,570	$95,228,284.32
Mar-08	23,088	$83,166,027.02
Apr-08	27,296	$98,616,579.78
May-08	29,305	$104,283,373.35
June-08	25,243	$89,786,459.83
July-08	22,238	$77,346,266.77
Aug-08	33,834	$120,819,791.05

Blame The ALJs

Public Radio's Marketplace program ran a piece yesterday on Social Security's backlogs. Commissioner Astrue was interviewed. Listen to the piece online. Here are the parts of the transcript of the piece with Astrue's comments:

Judge Robert Habermann hears disability cases in Roanoke, Va., and is an officer in the judge's union. He says the Social Security Administration is pressuring judges to just ram through positive decisions.

ROBERT HABERMANN: It solves a lot of problems by just paying the case. The individual claimant is out of the system. In other words, there are no appeals.

Haberman says those positive decisions could stack up to billions of dollars in wasted taxpayer money.

MICHAEL ASTRUE: Well I've heard that as a union line, but that's just not true. ...

MICHAEL ASTRUE: We've had judges who decided no cases in a year. And we've had judges that have fairly chronically decided double digits -- 40 cases a year.

In fairness, the transcript makes it clear that Astrue also told the reporter that Social Security needed more money to hire more Administrative Law Judges (ALJs), but it appears that Astrue gave about equal weight to more money and ALJ productivity.

First Impressions

I have started looking at the proposed new regulations on representation of claimants. My first impression is generally unfavorable.

The most important thing I was looking for in the proposal is simplification of the process when an attorney leaves my firm and is replaced by another attorney. Currently, this process requires the filing of several forms which Social Security often fails to enter into its computer system. It is a mess. This proposal will not help. The same forms must be filed with the same potential for problems. If anything, the process could become more problematic. Here is Social Security's summary:

Any entity seeking direct payment of fees must maintain, and provide to us upon our request, a signed statement from each of the entity’s attorneys and eligible non-attorneys who represent claimants before us. The statement must state that the attorney or eligible non-attorney is performing representational services on behalf of the entity. The statement must also assert that any fees should be paid directly to the entity and that the representatives receive any compensation directly from the entity. Any request for direct payment of fees made by an entity must include an attestation that the entity is in possession of this signed statement from each attorney or eligible nonattorney who has performed any representational services for the claim in question.

This raises the specter of a disgruntled departing attorney withdrawing his or her "signed statement" while asserting that he or she worked on each of the firm's cases, whether that was true or not. If that happened, the firm would become ineligible for direct payment of fees for any of its cases. This would be a nightmare. There would be considerable potential for blackmail by a disgruntled departing attorney.

Without much more clarification, I would not register my firm as an "entity" with Social Security.

Here is an interesting nugget that I do support:

We propose to revise our list of prohibited actions to include three additional items: refusing to comply with any of our regulations, violating any section of the Act for which a criminal or civil monetary penalty is prescribed, and assisting another individual whom we have suspended or disqualified.

Update: Here is the link to the NPRM in the Federal Register.

Proposed Regulations On Representatives Coming Monday -- Read Them Today

The Social Security Administration has filed a 99 page Notice of Proposed Rule-Making (NPRM) to be published in the Federal Register on Monday, but you can read it today. Here is Social Security's brief summary:

We are proposing several revisions to our rules on representation of parties. These proposed rules would recognize entities as representatives, define the concept of a principal representative, and authorize principal representatives to sign and file a claim for benefits on behalf of a claimant. These proposed rules would also mandate the use of Form SSA-1696 to appoint, revoke, or withdraw an appointment of a representative, and to waive a fee or direct payment of the fee. We propose to define the concept of a professional representative and require professional representatives to use our electronic services as they become available, including requiring professional representatives to submit certain requests for reconsideration or a hearing before an administrative law judge (ALJ) electronically. Finally, we propose to require representatives to keep paper copies of certain documents that we may require. We are proposing these revisions to reflect changes in representatives’ business practices and to improve our efficiency by enhancing use of the Internet.

Note that this is a proposal. The public can comment on the proposal. Social Security is supposed to consider the public comments. As a practical matter, this proposal cannot become official regulations until there is a new President. The new President, through the Office of Management and Budget, can refuse to approve the proposed regulations or demand changes as a condition for approval, not that I expect this proposal to be that controversial. I have not had time to study the proposal.

Update: Here is the link to the NPRM in the Federal Register.

Statistical Report On Disability Program Released

The Social Security Administration has released the Annual Statistical Report on the Social Security Disability Insurance Program, 2007.

Below is a table showing the final outcome of claims for recent years. The first percentage is defined as "Rate determined by dividing awards by all applications minus pending claims for that year" and the second percentage is defined as "Rate determined by dividing medical allowances by all medical decisions for that year." However you do the numbers, it has become significantly more difficult to get Social Security disability benefits since George W. Bush became President, even if you ignore the enormous increase in delays during the Bush Administration.

1999								56.0	61.3
2000								56.0	62.5
2001								55.4	62.7
2002								52.2	60.6
2003								47.7	59.4
2004								41.9	58.3
2005								40.5	56.3
2006								33.7	50.9

Another table shows that Social Security is terminating disability benefits due to work activity for one-half of one per cent of disability recipients each year. Thank goodness for Ticket to Work!