Understanding What's Important for Winning | The Disability Benefits Podcast #36

In this episode, we cover what the most important steps are for you to take in winning your disability case and receiving the benefits you're entitled to.

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Disability Consulting, LLC
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Disclaimer: We are a non-attorney firm. Our company specializes in representation for Social Security disability claims and is not a law office. The information provided in this video is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For legal guidance specific to your situation, please consult a licensed attorney.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Yeah, I know he's a composer. I love Joe Pesci, though. Yeah, oh I do too. Anyway. He's great. Well, yeah, speaking of Joe Pesci, let's get up to why that's why we're talking about Joe Pesci.

SPEAKER_00 0:10

We're talking about Joe Pesci because there's a scene in a great movie, My Cousin Vinny. It's funny that the most of the time when I'm talking about, you know, movies to my clients, it's two courtroom movies, you know, a few good men. It doesn't matter what I believe, it only matters what I can prove, which I tell my clients that a lot. And then in this one, we really are serious when we tell our clients, you need to get in medical treatment, it needs to be regular, so I have medical records to argue your case. And what we found in some cases, thank God, not all of them, but in some cases where the case manager is talking to our clients every you know two or three months, you know, you know, we've encouraged you to get into regular ongoing treatment. Well, I don't have any transportation. Okay, well, you have to, you know, bum a ride from somebody, but you have to get in. Okay, well, I'll I'll try, I'll try. Call a few months later. You know, have you gotten, you know, are there medical records that we can request? Um, well, you know, I don't have any money, I don't have any insurance. Well, there's the health department, and I'm gonna give you the address of the health department, and they're not gonna charge you anything, but you gotta get there, bum a ride from somebody, you gotta get there. All right, all right, all right, you know, send me that address, and we send them the address. Call a few months later, you know, can I request these medical records? Have you been there? No, no, I just I you know I just I haven't gotten around to it. Yeah. And so we're like a month before the hearing, and we're trying to tidy up everything. Basically, put it in a nice box and a bow for the judge to prove that you're disabled. We're gonna make a brilliant argument, and then we find out that in the last 18 months, even though we've talked to you every 45 or 60 days, and we have encouraged, encouraged, bugged, nagged, encouraged you to get medical treatment, you haven't. And so either I, as the rep or one of the other reps in the company, you know. We're going in front of a judge to prove your case. We have told you that the only way I can prove your disability is by medical records. And you didn't go to any of the any of the multiple times we told you we were gonna help find a place for you, you need a bummer ride, you know, this is free now, it's a health department, and you didn't go. What we're getting is the scene in My Cousin Vinny where the judge tells Joe Pesci early on, you know, when when you appear before me, I expect you to look loyally, because Joe Pesci's wearing a leather jacket. You know, he's look you know he's from the Bronx, you know, he's he's wearing a New York leather jacket. And so the next day in court he comes in and he's still wearing the leather jacket. And the judge is like, what are you wearing? What didn't I tell you that the next time you appear before me, you need to look lawyerly? And Joe Pesci says what a lot of my clients say. You are serious about that? Yes, we are serious about you getting medical treatment, and we're gonna bug you, we're gonna cheerleader, we're gonna nag, we're gonna be like your mom. And we are serious about that because the chances of you winning a disability case if you don't get medical treatment, which generates medical records, which is what I use to prove your case, the chances of you winning, shh, they just tank. So, yes, we're serious about that when we tell you you need to get in medical treatment, ongoing treatment, so it will generate medical evidence that we can present to the Social Security Administration.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Yeah. As far as great movie, by the way. I love the movie. As far as advice goes, like when we're talking to our clients about, hey, when you get this form, you need to fill it out, you need to send it back, you know, have you been into medical treatment? Have you done this? Have you done this? We're we're saying that for a reason. It's not like we're just like, eh, well, I'll bring it up and then whatever happens, happens. The reason is because if you don't fill out the form, they're gonna deny you, if you don't go get treatment, we can't prove that you have what, you know, the condition that you have that we know you have. There's doesn't matter, you know, to the other movie that you're talking about. It's just yeah, it doesn't you could have you could visibly be very disabled and mentally be very disabled, and you know it, and we know it, we believe you, but it doesn't matter if you don't get any kind of medical treatment. Right. And it seems like a lot of clients, they think that we're just like we have a list of things that we have to say, we have to tell the client, and then it's kind of just like whatever happens, happens. Right. But really, it's that we don't make any money unless we win the case, and we're bringing up things that will lead to you losing the case. Like if you don't fill out this form, you will lose. If you're not in treatment, you will lose. If you say this in the hearing, like you're hearing prep, you're not just prepping them and then like you know, just because you have to, you're just trying to be compliant. You're prepping them because you want to win the case. That's right. That's the whole point.

SPEAKER_00 5:23

Yeah, I have a vested interest in winning. Um, and it goes back to expertise. Um, why does somebody hire a rep? So if you're hiring a representative, you know, my firm, we've been in business 22 years. I've been in Social Security disability for 35. My associate reps have been, you know, almost that long in disability, certainly for you know 22 years. Um, have they uh seen almost everything that you can imagine in a disability hearing? Yes, they have. Have they seen and read denials that were based on claimants not doing things that they were supposed to do? Yes, we've seen all of those. And if you hire a representative, it's just like if you hire a plumber. Okay? You know, you can unclog a toilet. I mean, anybody can do that. But if somebody's got to cut through your flooring and replace a pipe within the walls, you're gonna count on their expertise to do that. You're gonna hire somebody who has expertise. And when you hire a disability representative, I know I'm basically saying that we're, you know, the analogy is to us to a plumber. Okay, but that's actually pretty true. We have expertise. If you trust our expertise, you'll do what we tell you. Because I will never tell you you're gonna lose a case if you don't do this, if it ain't true. You you tell Social Security that you can stand and walk for four or five hours at a time, I will tell you way before you appear before a judge, you're gonna lose. When you say that, you're gonna lose. Yep. And I'm right, because I have expertise. Um, if I tell you that, you know, you have to get medical records because there were if there's no medical records in your file, um, there's not a whole lot that I can point to other than, well, my client says they're disabled, and you should just believe them. So my expertise is like, you know, I've been doing this for a couple decades now. Um before that, I worked for Social Security. I know that if I looked at a case and okay, well, this person hasn't had treatment in 18 months. Hmm. How disabled are they that they don't even go to treatment for a year and a half? Yeah. How bad is their condition that they're not even seeing anybody? Um, it's not there's nothing persuasive about that. There's nothing trying to convince me that you're disabled, you know, if you're not even seeing anybody. And so when I worked for disability, I deny that case left and right. It happened all the time. And now I've jumped ship and I'm on the other side and I'm trying to help you win your case, I know of which I speak. And if I tell you that you have to have medical records, that you have to fill out the forms that they sent you, that you have to say things that might be embarrassing to you, that you don't want to say in a hearing, but it's the truth. If I tell you that, I'm not telling you that just because I'm checking off a list. You know, okay, I'm a representative, I have to do this, I have to do that. I'm telling you that because I'm helping you win. And I do have a vested interest in that. I do not get paid unless I win your case. Yeah. So I am not going to do anything, one, that would have you lose your case. But two, I'm also not going to stay silent when I see you doing foolish things, or in this case, not doing anything. Yeah. You know, just not, you know, not getting records, not getting into treatment. Um and when you when you look at things from kind of a big picture, you know, the 30,000 feet uh uh visual, when you're looking like that, well, there's social security disability. You're trying to win a disability case, but the bigger picture is your health. So get into treatment. It's probably going to improve your health. You might get some medication that helps you, you might get some therapy that helps you, you might, you know, be prescribed some exercises that you wouldn't even thought of that might help you. You're talking to somebody regularly like a therapist, it's helping you. Um you know, the big picture is your health. And so that's kind of a byproduct of what I'm asking you to do. But specifically, you've hired me for my expertise, and it's very frustrating when you just okay, I you know, I know the plumbers, you know, gotta cut through my floor, but I'm just not gonna use that toilet anymore. Um, I'm just you know, it's gonna stay clogged for the rest of the time that I live here because I'm just not gonna do what the plumber says I have to do. Okay. Yeah. You know.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

Yeah, I think the claimant just has to keep in mind that everything that we ask from them is actually important. Like we don't you don't tell your staff to just call the client, the clients that we have and just bug them all the time for no reason. If we're calling you and we're asking you to do something, you gotta understand it's important. You know, we don't we don't just get bored and then call you to say to do all these things that it's like it's optional and we just prefer to do it this way. No, we reach out to you and we say, hey, you need to do this if you want to win your case. Yeah you know, if you tell a client um when you're prepping them for the hearing, if you tell them when a judge asks a yes or no question, you gotta make sure you're not just rambling about everything that's ever happened to you in your life. The reason you're saying that, the implication is that if they do that, they're gonna lose. Yeah, they're gonna get denied. And so the claimant, yeah, they just got to keep in mind that everything we ask, all the advice we give them, everything we ask them to do, it is actually important and it's even crucial for their case.

SPEAKER_00 11:04

Yeah. It's required, and social security loves deadlines. So it's required, and it's required in a certain time frame, and that's why we'll call you up and we'll say, you know, we need this, or you have to fill out this form. It looks like you didn't fill out this form. You have to go to this exam. They scheduled it for you, they're paying for it, all they expect you to do is get there. And by the way, if you get there and it's over a certain amount of miles, they're gonna pay you for the miles that you traveled. They're leaving you no excuse not to go to this exam that they're buying for you. Go to the exam. Those are all things that are required, and um you know it's it's very frustrating. You know, you hire me for my expertise, and I tell you something, and you know. Maybe maybe he wasn't serious about that. You were serious about that? Yes, I was quite serious about that.

SPEAKER_01 11:57

Fortunately, we're doing phone hearings, so if you want to wear a leather jacket during your hearing, that's actually fair game. Yeah, going back to what we were talking about with the health department, just to you know, just to hit that a little bit harder, again, health departments are either low or no cost, so you can't say I don't have any money or don't have any insurance, right? Go to health department. If it's a mental health um diagnosis, or if part of your case is mental health diagnoses, um online telehealth, yeah. Man, and there are there are tons of companies out there that'll do free telehealth therapy, and that absolutely does count as medical records.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

That's right. And and you stole my thunder, because I was gonna say, from a mental health medical record standpoint, those are more common providing those services than a physical, you know, a health department you have to find, and the health department may not be in your county. Um if you live out in the boonies, it may not be very close to you. But mental health, you know, almost every state has some kind of program to where if you need mental health treatment, it's not gonna cost you anything. And you're right. Nowadays they'll do it telehealth. They'll basically, you know, you'll you'll be on a phone or it might be a FaceTime, it might be a Zoom call or something like that. But they will generate medical records, and those gen those medical records are valid. They're they're in fact they're crucial to your case. So yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 13:29

Yep. Is there anything else you want to press on with medical records?

SPEAKER_00 13:32

No, I think that's it.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

You know, it's a little harsh, but it's just one of those things that we keep we need to keep reminding clients. Yeah. Trust your representative, watch my cousin Vinny. But don't watch it and then expect your hearing to be anything like that. And don't watch it with children or anything. Yeah, don't watch it with children. Yeah, like you said, I mean, uh you watch I think you even say this in your your hearing prep. It's like all the all the movies you've seen about um civil cases and a hearing in front of a judge, uh administrative law judge, like your social security disability hearing, nothing like that. No. It's very, very tame. It's a conversation. Yeah, it's just a conversation.

SPEAKER_00 14:10

It's just yeah, it's it's it's low-key. Most of my clients say that it's boring. Yeah. But that's okay. You know you don't you don't want anybody pounding on a table. You're not disabled, you know. And you don't want me pounding on a table. He is disabled. You know, you just but we'll we'll make our argument and we'll make it cordially and we'll make it calmly, and that is very persuasive.

SPEAKER_01 14:31

Yeah, boring is good as long as it leads to in approval. That's right. Yeah, that's right. Okay. Yeah, we'll we'll leave it there. Cool. If you have a question about your disability case, drop it in the comment section below, and we will do our best to answer it in the next episode.