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Brian Therrien: Okay, Good day this is Brian Therrien here with Jonathan Ginsberg. How are you today Jonathan? Jonathan Ginsberg: I’m doing just fine thank you. Brian Therrien: Great. It’s a pleasure to have you with us. We’ve been anxious to have a conversation with you regarding the Social Security Disability benefit topic and there’s a lot of information that people want to know about this topic. We’ve been asked all kinds of stuff and understood that it’s difficult to receive and it takes a long time to get it. The process is very challenging to figure out and dealing with the Social Security office’s are not the easiest thing to do. So, we are anxious to learn from your perspective all about that and who qualifies. What conditions and problems count as valid disabilities? Who decides it? How do you file, on and on and on and on. Let’s get started. You have been working in the Social Security Disability realm for quite some time, since 1997. Is that correct?
Jonathan Ginsberg: I’ve been practicing law for about twenty years and about half that time I’ve been doing Social Security Disability. Brian Therrien: Yep. So you represent clients seeking to get Social Security Benefits. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely, I represent clients. I represent adults, children, widows, a whole variety of people. What they all have in common is that they feel that they meet the requirements for disability for Social Security and they want to try to get benefits. Brian Therrien: Okay. And your clients are mostly where, in the country? Jonathan Ginsberg: Most of my clients are in Georgia. My office is in Atlanta, although I have travelled as far as Buffalo, New York and Birmingham and various other places. The one thing about Social Security is that because it is a National program, attorneys do not necessarily need to be living or licensed in a particular place to represent people. I find though that one of the advantages for staying local is you get to know the doctors and you get to know the judges, which is probably the most important factor. But, I have represented people is various parts of the country. Brian Therrien: Interesting. We’ve looked around long and hard to find the resident expert on this and the work that you’ve done in this area has been interesting. I have noted that recently you’ve even taken your message out on a national level and started doing a blog and an internet radio station. So on behalf of everybody that is subject to this topic, thank you for your effort. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, I appreciate that. I have a good time with it and I find that when I answer questions from people all over the country, and I get a lot of questions everyday, it really does help to keep me sharp. It helps me to become a better lawyer and I get information out of there that I think that sometimes people don’t otherwise have access to. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. So can you share with us how many cases, or different situations have you represented over the years. Jonathan Ginsberg: I was thinking about that the other day and I think probably, easily over a thousand people. A thousand claimants that I have represented myself or when I had a previous firm before this law firm. But I think all in all it’s probably over a thousand people. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: And of course, I talk to a lot more. Even though I don’t represent a lot of the folks that I answer questions for, I’m constantly answering questions, so again, I wouldn’t say that I represent those people, but I am talking to a lot of people. But I think that people that I have actually done work for in court, is probably close to a thousand. Probably a thousand maybe a little bit over that. Brian Therrien: Fantastic. What do you see Jonathan, as some of the top challenges that are facing people? You should have a good idea after that many cases. Jonathan Ginsberg: I think by far the biggest problem that I’ve seen is folks trying to get regular medical treatment from a doctor to build a solid record. Social Security is real focused on getting records from treating physicians, getting reports from treating physicians and with the cost of medical insurance and the cost of trying to get good quality care, that’s a real problem. I think that is probably the biggest issue that I seen, is getting that. Because you have to realize that judges in Social Security cases are monitored by people looking at their work. There’s appellet judges who have the right to look at decisions and if a judge issues a decision that is not properly supported it will be overturned and judges are very concerned about having their decisions and findings overturned. So basically that’s the biggest problem I think. The days that a judge could say I kind of like this person and I am going to go ahead and approve, those days are pretty much over. The second big problem that we see is people that are undergoing a lot of hardship, because of delays the process. As you may know, the delays sometimes can end up being two or three years. One of the questions I get, and we will probably talk about this today is how you eat when you are waiting for two or three years for Social Security to make it’s decision. I reference several of my websites; GAO Studies says that the amount of time that Social Security will actually work on a file is about seven days and close to three years. So the rest of that time the files are just sitting around and the people are just waiting and not getting much done. Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: So I’d say those are the two biggest problems. Getting good medical records and the big delays. Brian Therrien: So the medical records, is it that they’re not properly kept or, tell me more about that. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay, it’s not so much that the records are not properly kept, its that if someone doesn’t have the money to go to a doctor on an ongoing basis. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Then there is no way for that medical record to be completed that otherwise would be. So again, realize we are talking about two to three years sometimes as a term for a case to be processed and if the last medical records filed are dated a year and a half ago. I got in front of the judge and he’s going to want to know what is going on now and my answer I, you honour, I don’t have any updated medical records, my client can’t afford to go to the doctor. Well Social Security will send people to these consultative evaluations, but a lot of times those are not real helpful and they sometimes don’t really help the claimant at all. A lot of the doctors of these industrial clinics that are looking for reasons not to help people. I mean, sure viewed by Workers Comp. the company and so forth. The hardest part of getting assistance are thorough medical records. Social Security is real big on having a consistent medical record from treating physician that basically supports our theories and case. It’s one of the things I do and I would tell anybody doing their own case or working with an attorney, you have to have what I would call a work experience disability for your case. You’ve got to be able to explain to the judge why this person is disabled, the theory of the case. If you don’t know your own theory, you can’t really expect a judge to have a theory either. So I think that having those solid medical records is really important to developing the theory on the case. Brian Therrien: Jonathan. When you say consistent medical records, consistent treatment. Is that every month? Every week? Jonathan Ginsberg: Good question. You know, I think l it can be every six months. It can be every four months. It can be every nine months. It has to be some sort of a consistent, I think it needs to be more then yearly. But again, you take what you get. Sometimes if somebody can only afford to go to the doctor once a year, then they go once a year. But certainly, I encourage people to go to free clinics if they need to. Public hospitals, if they’ve got them there. I guess part of it is the judges feel like if someone is not getting medical treatment, they are not going to the doctor, then it must not be that serious. If you were really really hurting you would go to an Emergency Room or something like that. Brian Therrien: Very good. Jonathan Ginsberg: So going with some frequency, even to the point that I’ll tell people, that you may have to go to friends and relatives and try to put together the money scrape the money together so that you can go to the doctor, because it is that important. Brian Therrien: So that clearly explains it. That’s a great point and good advice for people that if they are gonna go and seek Social Security Disability; they need to be prepared to have a consistent medical record. And then the hardship, we’ll talk more about that later. Okay good, so let’s go forward a little bit. At some point in time through all of this in the last few years you sat down and did a great service to people and put all of this information into a “How-to-kit” and you call that the Disability Answer Guide, correct? Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s correct. Brian Therrien: Give us just a sneak preview of that. I don’t want you to spill the beans, but give us an idea of why you did it? What is does? Yeah, we’d like to hear that. Jonathan Ginsberg: Right and how it works. Well, basically, you know, the Disability Answer Guide came about because of client complaints. The people that I’ve talked to, kind of on a day to day basis about the complexity and confusion of the official Social Security Disability Form. If you think about it, it kind of makes sense, you know a lot of people who are applying for disabilities they are hurting, their back hurts and they may have some level of depression, they don’t feel well. They now, all of a sudden, have the task of essentially going back to school and filling out and I think I counted over a hundred pages of form. And of course the governments forms, Social Security Forms are typical government forms. They’re confusing. They don’t have any instructions with them. They are really asking in language that is sometimes designed to help the person reading the form, meaning the adjudicator, as opposed to the claimant,. I think also, just from my observation over the years. These forms are kind of a hodge podge, that they’ve been developed over time and what they’ll do is they’ll keep adding to the form but they wont really re-do it. So sometimes you’ll have the same question asked three and four times and for someone that is not a lawyer, someone that is not familiar with the lingo and the terms of art. We will talk about some of the terms of art as well, if you are not familiar with that stuff, these forms are just an insurmountable burden. I’ve had many people, I clearly can recall people telling me that they filed the application, got it denial, but never filled out the appeal form, because they didn’t know how. And it was just too confusing. They let the 60 day deadline go by and they had to start all over again. And so sometimes I’ll get these cases where someone has applied two or three times and never appealed it because they didn’t know how. I really put the credit on my clients, because they are the ones that told me about this and I just started thinking about it one day and said, you know, if I were in their shoes; what would I want? And so I put it together based on that thought process. Brian Therrien: Interesting. So, what I’m hearing is the forms that are available out there, which we’ll talk about later are to apply for Social Security Disability are really written for a lawyer or somebody in the Social Security office to fill out. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, I guess, here is the way I see it. At the initial level, when somebody applies for disability, the case is taken in and it goes to something called the State Agency, which is actually a division of the State where you live. And the personnel there are hard working people, but they are essentially hourly employees, that are looking for very specific things. So they made the form so that these people can look at the same place on every form for certain words and certain evidence, so that they can process it through. Well, what works for them, doesn’t necessarily work for the claimant. So again, a lot of the short hand on these forms in the terms of art, that you wouldn’t know were terms of art, because they just look like regular language, it means something completely different to the adjudicator then it will mean to you and me, if you didn’t know any better. So that’s really he issue, the forms are designed for processing, by the processor, but they’re not necessarily designed, at least in my opinion, for the person filling it out. There is really not a lot of even use, not even instruction. It’s gotten even worse more recently because they are moving toward electronic forms, where there’s no way to see what the next question is going to be. Brian Therrien: Ohhh. Jonathan Ginsberg: At least with the paper forms, you can look at the form, maybe study it and think about it and do a trial run. Electronically, you are actually online trying to do it and there’s no practice form. It’s very, very confusing. It’s really intimidating, is the best word I can use to describe it. Brian Therrien: So help me understand some of the lingo that you’re sharing with us here. The claimant; this is the person that is seeking disability? Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s correct. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: The person that is seeking to get approved for disability is called a claimant. Brian Therrien: Okay. And then what is the other word you used there. Adjudicator? Something? Jonathan Ginsberg: Adjudicator is the person that is making a decision. Adjudication means to make a decision. So an adjudicator is the Social Security personnel, or in fact, State Agency person, that is at an office in, typically two or three of them in a state. What they are looking for is specific language on the forms. Again, they are not really trained or authorized to use a lot of judgement. What they’re doing, what they’re doing is just trying to find certain words, that’s pretty much it. The adjudicators, again, they work hard. Just to give you an idea, I went one time on a tour. Sometimes Social Security will offer attorneys an opportunity to go meet some of these adjudicators because we don’t really ever see them or talk to them too much. I went into this building and it was like three or four stories and the intake room was literally piled from floor to ceiling with files. And the adjudicators that I talked to told me that they were responsible for processing these files on a pretty regular basis and they had to get them out of their office fairly quick. So again, this is not looked at the way, the judge might look at it, how it is looked at in the real careful manner. They just go through them, they have got to be so overwhelmed with numbers. The poor Social Security personnel are being, taking and cutting the numbers of personnel and are so understaffed that it’s a tough job, a real tough job. And that’s really what the whole point of the guide is, is to give them what they want in the language that they need to think, or that they want. Brian Therrien: Yes, so you’ve really put a guide together, gone through and put directions on the process just like you’re sitting there next to somebody in your office. Jonathan Ginsberg: Exactly, what I did was I took all the forms and I filled them out as if I was the claimant. I filled them out using the language that I know that Social Security adjudicators and personnel will respond to and occasionally I would put certain parts of it in the guide, I’ll say, you’ll want to use this exact phrase. This is something that speaks to them. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Really talk to them in their language, is what we are trying to do. Brian Therrien: Very good. Okay. Now I have lots and lots of questions that have been asked of us. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay. Brian Therrien: In respect to time, I really would be anxious to go through and get your opinion on some of the challenging issues that are troubling people as they go through this application process. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay. Brian Therrien: One of the first ones is how does one go about finding if they qualify for Social Security Disability benefits? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, there are a couple ways to answer that question. Let me start with the what I call my, Do I qualify? Let me draw a distinction first between SSI, Supplemental Security Income and SSDI, which is disability. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Because that is the initial question even before you qualify. They may qualify for one, for both or for neither. SSDI, is a system where people have paid into the system with taxes and essentially the rule is they must have worked five out of the last ten years. They do it by quarters of credits. For example, and the way they do it now is. If you earned a certain amount of money you are said to have enough credits for the year. So projecting in 2006, if you have earned $970 per quarter or a total of $3,880 for the year then you are insured, so once you hit that approximately $3,880 or $3,900, and you add it up, you’ll receive four quarters of credit. So in the last ten years, have you had approximately that much money earned, in half that time. If you had you are considered insured and entitled to SSDI. If you have not worked in twenty years, but before that you worked for 20 straight years, you’re out of luck. That doesn’t count, it only works for the last ten years. And the ten years actually adjusts down a little bit, say if you were 25 or 26, you might have to show the same as if you were 70. It’s three years out of six, or four years out of eight. But in general for most people it is going to be five out of eleven, and it’s got to be recent work. SSI is for people who have not qualified for Title II Disability, but haven’t worked enough but they still meet the definition of disability. You can qualify for both, but you are only going to get paid for the higher of the two. The additional answer to your question is, do I qualify for Title II SSDI, because I’ve worked enough to build it up in the system or am I a SSI only person? Based on that we just kind of move forward and I have to say this about SSI. We can talk more about it if you like. SSI is potentially the welfare program that is available to low income people that don’t have the resources over, I think it’s $2000 or has a house income that is relatively small amount, they do not qualify for SSI. So the fiscal impression that I get is that, like there is a woman that might write me or call me and say that I have worked for twenty years as a homemaker, I am disabled and my husband works. She would not qualify for SSI because of her husbands income would be too much and would disqualify her. So, the initial question is am I SSI ? Am I SSDI? Obviously, it easier to the odds are so much better for someone that is working throughout and then not working. That’s the initial qualification question. Brian Therrien: That was $3800 a year for, okay, so a snapshot of the last ten years and looking at… Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, in 2006, again we are looking at 2005 of $3860 and 2004 was $3600. They adjust it every year. So, around three and four thousand dollars a year income in that range in the last five or six years, you are probably okay. One of the forms on this particular guide, that people that can get on the net, it’s a form that I offer on the website, is the Form 7004. They fill out the 7004, they will get back a statement from Social Security that tells them if they are insured or not. Brian Therrien: Oh. Jonathan Ginsberg: So they can do that. It’s free. It doesn’t cost a thing for them to do. Again, it’s one fo the links at the bottom of the page on the website and you can get that form. One of the things I do, whenever I take a case, I request that 7004 statement and have it sent to me so that I can see if my client is in fact insured. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Because the last thing that you want to do is show up for a hearing after waiting two or three years to find out that the fact that they are not insured for disability and they don’t qualify for SSI and you’re out of luck. Brian Therrien: It almost sounds like Step 1. Jonathan Ginsberg: It is. It really is. You have got to know it. In fact, I tell people when they apply to make sure that they apply for both. I tell them when they are applying, whether they apply through the 800# or in person, to make sure that you tell them I want to apply for both Title II disability and for Title VI through SSI. So that you have that on the record and if you don’t qualify for one, the have taken the application for the other. Brian Therrien: That’s great information, the next part of it. Jonathan Ginsberg: The next part of it is the definition of disability. That’s really then the next step, is to see whether you meet the definition, ultimately though either a Judge or an Adjudicator makes that decision. Brian Therrien: Yeah, but you should have an idea of which select conditions count. Do all conditions count? Diabetes, heart conditions, Fibro, obesity etc. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay. First of all the definition by Social Security standards is, and I’ll read it to you: is it medically determinable condition or conditions that prevents the claimant from performing financially gainful activity that has lasted or is expected to last twelve months, twelve consecutive months or result in death. So, the definition is looked at a long term. It’s not a short term, not a temporary disability, but something that is long term that will be noticed particularly on a work capacity. So to answer your question, it is any condition or conditions or sort of medical problems, diabetes, heart problems, fibro myalgia or kidney issues, liver problems. Any type of medical problem at all, but it has to be long lasting. It has to be lasting at least a year and it has to prevent the claimant from participating in work or work like activities. Brian Therrien: So, if somebodies in the workplace and they have a career and they’re making a decent salary, so let’s use this example. Somebodies earning fifty thousand dollars a year and something happens and they are not able to do that job anymore. Let’s say that that job relies on them to do a physical participation in their job, lifting or pushing or something of that sort. So then they become, something happens to them and they are not able to do that physically, so then, how does that work, because they are not able to do that job, but maybe there is something else that they can retool and get a different set of skills and go out and do. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely, that is a very, very important point and I get this question a lot. Social Security is really about performing in any kind of job. So someone might be a neurosurgeon, for example and might develop a carpel tunnel in his or her hand. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: She couldn’t do that type of work no more, but she could be a ticket taker at a movie theatre. Brian Therrien: Ahh. Jonathan Ginsberg: As long as she can perform some sort of a job and actually accomplish, you are not disabled. Now there are exceptions to this rule, for people a little bit older. Once they enter their fifties or fifty-five, then the rules apply to some cases, but generally the question is could you perform any kind of simple unskilled sit down type of job. In fact, the focus again, being on vocation for the past years, going to the hearings, the judges will almost always have someone from the vocational activist there to talk about this persons ability to perform, even the most simple unskilled type of job. If there are certain jobs that the attorneys kind of joke about, because they always come up every year. A surveillance or a monitor, or a hand packer, a document sorter or textile inspector, things like that. These are simple unskilled sit down type of jobs that someone with a moderate level of pain has the sit down option and not have a high production quotient, but it still allows them to earn some sort of a living in a competitive workplace setting and that’s really what you have to look at. Not that you can go back to your past work, it’s can you do anything at all? Brian Therrien: Okay. Let’s move on to a slight variation of the above. We’ve been asked by members several times; how bad does my condition have to be? They’ve gone through, let’s back up, they’ve gone through and found out that they can apply for SSDI, they are covered with it. 704 statement, right? They are in the process and it’s just. It’s taking a long time and their condition is bad, one of the people wrote in and said, do I have to be just about dead to get it? So, can you address that? Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, I have actually had a couple clients die in the process so sometimes… Brian Therrien: It’s unbelievable, yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: I remember one case, probably, oh, eight or nine years ago, one of my clients rolled her on a gurney, she couldn’t move and they actually rolled her into the hearing room and strapped her in. She was lying down for the entire hearing. Brian Therrien: Oh man. Jonathan Ginsberg: Sometimes it seems that way and again, part of the reasons is that in those cases, they clearly ought to be an approved early; you’ve got to know how to apply to Social Security to tell them why it should be approved. It can get that way sometimes, again, part of the reason why people get denied to be honest is because they don’t know how to, again how to apply for benefits. There are two basic ways to prove disability. It kind of gets back to that theory of the case idea. One is; does the person meet what is called a medical listing. What medical listings are, Social Security has published in something that they call The Code Of Regulations, what they call a list of impairments that, basically divides the body into fourteen different systems and each system is, one is the muscular skeletal, one is respatory, one is digestive, cardio vascular, etc. one for internal health, one for cancer. Basically what these listings do is describe a medical condition in great detail and they talk about some functional limitations that arise from it. The idea being that if your diagnosed with something so severe, for example, your heart pumping capacity, is so severe under subjective tests and it results in certain limitations in your ability to walk or stay awake or whatever it may be. Then you are automatically stated disabled. Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: So that is one thing that is ideal and ideally in the system is you need a listing for the adjudicator to process and approve that. So that’s what they’re looking for. That’s why people get denied because they are not telling the adjudicator the words they are looking for. To meet the type of listing, and to look at the listing and use the terms in that listing to describe their condition. Brian Therrien: Goes to filling out the forms correct. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely, it goes back to filling out the forms. The second way to win a case, if you don’t meet a listing, a lot of times people do not meet a listing, because A, they are very difficult to meet and B; lot of those have combination problems. They have a series of depression issues along with a bad back problem and neither one of them meet a listing, but the combination, they are in pretty bad shape. That argument is called a functional capacity argument, or the legal term for it is residual dysfunctional capacity. What that means is that you want to show Social Security that your capacity for work is so reduce by your condition or a combination of conditions that you would not be able to sustain competitive employment at any work level, any type of level in any type of competitive work environment. So again, it’s almost solely about work capacity. I have even had cases where people have medical conditions that are not clearly defined on the list. I have had cases sometimes, the prospect of going in front of a very difficult judge or my client had swelling of the leg. Nobody knew why, they couldn’t determine why he had swelling of the leg, but the end result was he couldn’t walk, without regular paid. It was documented that he had the swelling and the judge felt like well, he cannot function, his concentration level is impaired, his capacity to work, having to work and lift and carry for a certain amount of time. He couldn’t sit for more then a certain period of time and that combination of her conditions and her functional capacity, what they call less then sedentary, does not lend to that kid of job. So, part one is you need a listing, theory two is do you have the functional capacity that is less then a simple sit down kind of job. Brian Therrien: Okay. Great. Next one, let me see how I can best, well, I will just ask it as it is. Going through the approval process, we had some people write in and say listen, last Saturday night I had six cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon and the officer pulled me over and I’m going to get a D.W.I. Is that going to affect my chances of getting disability? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, there are two answers to that question. Number one is that if you are incarcerated you can’t get. They don’t pay. So the days when an incarcerated felon could get monthly checks from Social Security, those days are over. So, if you’re on benefits and you’re receiving your check and you get put in jail for some reason, you don’t get paid for that time. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Now, I’ve had situations where I literally tried cases in lockup, which is where somebody can apply for benefits that are temporarily in lockup, but it wasn’t going to be a long term thing and the judge actually went to the jail, went to the prison with me and we tried the case there. Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I was tell you those cases are not the best cases, it’s an uphill battle, but there is some situations where somebody has had something happen. An example would be, if they got locked up for child support problems. They aren’t going to be able to get out, but it had nothing to do with their condition or any other kind of moral purposes. They didn’t pay the child support because they didn’t have the money and that would affect them getting approved, although while they are in lockup they are not allowed to receive benefits. Now, the second part of your question is that, I figure while we are on the subject, I should mention. One of the things about Social Security is if they find that substance abuse, whether it is alcohol or drugs, any type of substance abuse, is what they call a material contributing factor to disability, then you are not eligible for disability. If you are an alcoholic, but your condition would improve or stabilized if you stopped drinking, you don’t get disability. Brian Therrien: Oh, interesting point. Jonathan Ginsberg: Now, if you, although I have won cases for alcoholics that have been drinking for so long that their liver has been damaged to the point where they have organ damage and their liver function, the tests are so that they might need a listing. I have won cases like that, but I have had a couple situations where people are drug abusers and because there are using cocaine or whatever and they have mental issues, it’s a different, the judges will often separate that as underlying depression. For example, that might be case that can be won, but those are very difficult cases. Substance abuse or drug abuse, those are real red flags that go up with that. Brian Therrien: Okay, great. Thanks for sharing that. Key is, be careful. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes, be careful. The key is that you’ve got to be very careful when going through medical records, doctors are very sensitive about people, who especially if they are on some pain medication, that are abusing that privilege. In other words, they are getting their prescription from the doctor, that doctors not going to find out that they are going to another doctor and getting the same prescription from the other doctor. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Once a term like drug abuser or malingering, gets into the medical records, because it will percolate down to that medical record, it becomes a real problem. Judges don’t like to pay people who they think are potentially playing games. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Good to know. Jonathan Ginsberg: Which makes sense, if you think about it. Brian Therrien: Yeah, I can see where it would. Jonathan Ginsberg: On the other hand there are people sometimes who are legitimately under such severe pain that they might either self medicate or they may take additional pain killers because of such intense pain. The doctors give them documented Percocet. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I guess the message I would say is that you are having a pain issue and the doctor does not understand what you are going through, you may want to look into getting another doctor. And you follow it through, you just don’t let it appear in the record. Brian Therrien: Rather then self-medicating. Jonathan Ginsberg: Exactly, every time you start doing stuff like that, self medicate, you know, that’s not okay, that’s a problem. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s a problem. Brian Therrien: Next topic. Money and lack there of and having money and going through the approval process. More specifically, can somebody go through the approval process and be awarded if they’re self employed, have an interest in a business, own investments, I guess, what income asset issues affect, if any, the approval process? Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s a good question and it does pop up. As a rule if there is any kind of asset that is truly capital, that would not impact their ability to get Title II disability. It would affect SSI, but not Title II. If someone had a rental property for example, they were earning of $500/month from that, it might show up on their earnings record and the might be prepared to explain that, but it’s not work activity. Again the definition performing substantial gainful activity. If they are not doing anything, then it should not be a problem. Now, I will tell you that Social Security see’s earnings above eight or nine hundred dollars. The presumption is that this is work income and that you are earning something. So if a claimant has had a passive income that they are not actually doing anything, they need to be prepared to show evidence of what that is. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s one point. As far as part-time work, basically Social Security has a concept again, called Financial Gainful Activity. For 2006, the financial amount was $860. So if you are earning less a year then $860, then you have not sustained a financial worth. If you are over $860, then they think you are. So, as a rule, if you are working part-time, you want to watch that and make sure that your earnings do not exceed that level, because if you get to a $1000/month, that would even be worse. I tell you as a matter of strategy, I find that people that work part-time. Those cases are much, much more difficult, because the judges tend to feel that if someone can work part-time, they can probably work full time on a little bit lighter job. So, generally as strategy matter, I don’t ever say to somebody don’t work. I just tell them if they work part-time, that kind of goes against them into the negative column as far as disability, Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: So the legal answer is they can work. They can try to work. They can do part-time work and earn a small amount of money, but the practical matter is a way for them to lose their SSDI. Brian
Therrien: Sounds crazy. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, although the other thing. The flip side of that is that trials for unsuccessful work attempts, what they can UWA, Unsuccessful Work Attempts can actually be very compelling evidence, because I can use that to show the judge, look my client has been trying to work but they cant do it and unsuccessful work attempts generally are something that last’s less then three months. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I’ve got a reference for a personal work for less then three months, for only six weeks and missed three or for times during this time they were awaiting the hearing. That’s actually good evidence, because it shows that they have the right attitude and that they are trying, but they can’t do it. I’ve got somebody that works one job for nine months, part-time and that’s problematic. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: If he worked four jobs for a month and a half it would be fine. Brian Therrien: So what I see here is I look at this and everybody that participates in our work force out there, works at different levels. There’s different capacities, different jobs and different incomes and they pay into the system in different amounts. But everybody that is awarded is paid the exact same amount, is that correct? Jonathan Ginsberg: No. No, again, SSDI, Social Security Disability, the amount of your monthly benefit is a reflection of what you have paid in. It’s the very, very complicated calculation based on what they call the PIA or Primary Insurance Amount, and I mean, I can read it to you. But I won’t advise you or anybody else what it means. It’s a confusing formula. Essentially what it looks at is what you would get in retirement if there’s adjustments onto that. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Essentially what it means is you paid into the system. The more that you paid into the system the higher your benefits turn out to be. Typically I see people getting $1000 - $1800 a month SSDI. SSI by contrast, is the same. That is a statutory amount and the maximum for example for 2006 is $603, that’s six, zero, three for a married couple would be $904, so basically SSI is set by statute, subsidiary, opt in and the opt in might be the cash equivalent to a housing bill or for other things like that. SSI claimants, the most they are getting is $600/month less some sort of a cash equivalent or depending on what kind of help they are getting. Brian Therrien: Okay, but the earnings amount is consistent, regardless of if you’re SSDI check is $1000 or $1800, you still can only earn that… Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s correct. Brian Therrien: Okay. Alright, that’s great. Thank you for clarifying that. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes, the amount of return is limted. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: And it is adjusted every year to take in account inflation. Brian Therrien: So now that we’re talking about the work subject. Let’s say that somebody wants to go out and they say, you know what, I want to give a go at this and try to go back to work. They go back to work and it just isn’t working out. Either they are not able to work or their condition gets worse and they have to, you know, they’ve got to go back. Can they get their benefits back if they had lost them in that attempt? Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes, well first of all there’s something important to know about it’s called a filed work period. Social Security recognizes and they encourage people on how to go back to work. So basically what the trial work period says, in the first nine months after the income is stable that you can go back to work and get a job and I think it’s about $620 a month before it loses the Trial Work status. Even if you are earning over that. You are still going to get your benefits, and you get to keep what you earned from the job. So if you try to work for nine months, it’s not going to effect your benefits at all. Now, after the nine months, and it’s nine months every five years, in a five year period of time. So it would be nine months, ten years from now you could apply again, and you would have another nine months to play with. After that, basically, they would cut you off. And if they cut you off, and you become disabled again, you will have to go through the whole process all over again. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: I believe, again, I’ll be honest with you. I don’t normally get involved with the post disability issues cases. My understanding is you have to apply all over again. It may be the process; I don’t want to confuse anybody about that. Since I am not familiar with it, I mean, that’s a good question for my blog, I’ll put it on there. Brian Therrien: All right, great. This might be more of a tax expert question but the $806 or $860. Jonathan Ginsberg: It’s $860 Brian Therrien: It’s $860. The $860 that you can earn, if somebody is, let’s say there are earning that money as being self employed. Jonathan Ginsberg: All right. Brian Therrien: Is it looked at what they net after taxes and expenses, or is it the same as, how is that viewed, do you know? Jonathan Ginsberg: I think, I believe it is the gross income. Brian Therrien: The gross income. Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: There are a lot of tax income questions I get on my benefits package and the answer of that question is depends on what the household income is. Some benefits are not taxable at all, others are subject to taxes. That’s a better question for a tax attorney. Brian Therrien: Okay. All right. That’s god to know, we’ll find one and get the answer for that. Okay, so we’ve covered some good stuff here. What happens when somebody reaches retirement age, do they still get their disability benefits? Jonathan Ginsberg: What will happen is this, the Social Security Administration will convert their, at retirement age, they will convert their disability retirement and typically retirement is going to be a higher benefit amount, again based on the PIA amount. So they will get the higher income amount. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: I believe that happens. It actually is a really good question. I think that it happens at, if I am not mistaken. I think it happens at 65 or at retirement age. Although I’ve read someplace that it may happen earlier in some states. That would be a good question. But I don’t have the research on the blog. Brian Therrien: On your blog. Okay. Great. Great. Getting started somebody comes through and you’ve given some great advice Jonathan, on what the first steps are and one of the big questions is how long does it take? Jonathan Ginsberg: Oh. How long does it take…. Brian Therrien: It’s a million dollar question. Jonathan Ginsberg: A million dollar question. Let me give you some general guidelines and that is when you apply for benefits, the initial application, from my own observations could take up to five to seven months. Where you have the adjudicator takes the file and it is taken by Social Security and they package it up and they send it over to the state agency office and the adjudicator begins to develop a case, requesting copies of medical records as they come back in, the files themselves can either be looked then, it usually takes five to seven months. You then have sixty days, to file an Appeal for Consideration. The Appeal for Consideration is the first step of the appeal and they have actually tried to phase that out because the process doesn’t open the gates. But right now the Appeal for Consideration, is going to take another 60-90 days maybe a little bit longer. They will go ahead and issue you a denial or approval. Reconsideration is kind of a waste of time for very serious cases. A hearing for reconsideration could be another six to nine months between the denial and the reconsideration and then within 69 days you file for a hearing. From the time that you file for a hearing and you actually get a hearing ranges from a year to two years. So the whole process from start to finish and you get a hearing and get a completion. It is running around two and a half years nationwide. Brian Therrien: Two and a half years? Jonathan Ginsberg: Unfortunately, two and a half years. Brian Therrien: Okay. I’ve got lots of questions here. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay. Brian Therrien: Let’s go back through the five to seven months time frame and in that time frame; you had mentioned, well, I’ll ask this question first. If somebody is really defined as being disabled and I forget the exact terminology that you used, but if it’s spotted within that five to seven month period, is there is a chance that they would be awarded benefits. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely and that’s really the prime time where a claimant ought to emphasize that they need a listing. Brian Therrien: A listing? Jonathan Ginsberg: A listing, where they have been approved. It’s the only reality way that they are going to get approved. And 90% of the time it will be a listing. Brian Therrien: Okay. But if they don’t have a listing, their chances in the first five to seven months are…. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well again, it depends and one of the things that I have tried to do with my book is, I give them some of the forms, specifically the functional capacity forms that they can get the doctor to fill out that might, you know, allow the disability adjudicators to make a decision. But again, realize that there are two theories of winning a case, one is using a listing, number two is your functional capacity is less then sedentary. You have limited functional capacity for work. Meeting a listing is something that the adjudicators are looking for. However, they are also trained to look for functional capacity evaluation. Those forms are considered by Social Security. What I’ve done is I’ve modified it to the point where it really addressing the specifications that the adjudicator is looking for. So I’ve had a number of good set of feedback from people who have win functional capacity at that early stage because they are using my forms. Brian Therrien: Back to the forms. Jonathan Ginsberg: My form, right. My form is not one of the official forms, it is one that I use in my practice, but again, I know that it works because of the judges, or the adjudicators will back it up. Brian Therrien: So. I am hearing a few things here, within the first five to seven months or the first submission, if you can outline a listing or functional capacity and fill the forms in right, you maximize your chances. Is that right? Jonathan Ginsberg: Correct, you want to have your doctor to help you fill the form out. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: So really what I do is, you know, in the book, what I do is I give an example of the forms filled out in a way that will win the case. So, it’s almost like a “dummy form” because it’s already filled out and I have a blank one too. So you take your doctor a sample of this form already filled out. This is what it would take if I am going to take it to the doctor and filled it out not like this, and I don’t know who the physician is, but if the doctor truly wants to help you and feels you are disabled. This is the tool that you need to help Social Security to determine your case. Brian Therrien: Okay Jonathan, if you were to take a look at all the cases that you or the cases that you’ve represented. Can you give us an idea off the top of your head of what percentage are able to either have a listing or prove function capacity and awarded in this first round. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well again, I don’t really see if they are award initially because I don’t normally get involved until they have been denied. Brian Therrien: Oh. Ok. Jonathan Ginsberg: Again, that gets back to why I wrote the book is because you don’t need a lawyer at the initial onset. There’s really no reason for having an attorney as a claimant, because there is not really anything we can rally do And again, the whole point of the book si this is how you feel the forms out initially, by the claimant without an attorney involved anyway. So the only thing that I can do at this initial stage is I can help build the record by submitting the initial medical records and making sure that the functional capacity records are in the file, but again, that is something hat the claimant can do on his own and save himself a lot of money. Brian Therrien: We’re going to talk more about that. Jonathan Ginsberg: All right. Brian Therrien: That really helps clear it up. So, as a general rule if it’s not awarded as a listing there a functional capacity you’re saying two and a half years as an average. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s right. Brian Therrien: Wow, and during that time, it’s not beneficial for people to work for the reason that you outlined, so this really, boy this is challenge. Jonathan Ginsberg: It is and the questions that I get is how do I eat? What am I supposed to do in the meantime and if they have a spouse? I have seen people, you know, literally three or four time a week, that have had to file bankruptcy, that are literally living hand to mouth because they have one spouse another that can work and the other cant.. The ones that have no spouse they are the ones that go homeless. It’s bad. Brian Therrien: Do you have any tips for them? Any suggestion? Jonathan Ginsberg: You know, I wish I did. This is a major problem, I tell people at the onset, this is going to be a long road and you need to really minimize your expenses and if you need to file bankruptcy to get rid of stuff, you gotta do that. You can, but you are financially going to plummet, people ask me and the only thing that you can really do is not work all the time. You can rewrite your congressman and Senator and say that I have a dire need and that is the term you use, dire need for a decision because I am about to lose my house. I am about to be homeless and some cases the Senators and Social Security liaisons will be able to do a little bit, but that is becoming less effective as more people find out about it. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: But there is really not much you can do, in fact this whole redesign process, is that Social Security is trying to implement is designed to eliminate the listing phase to speed up the process, but again, I don’t see how it is going to work without more personnel and they are cutting the personnel. So, it’s really unclear to me as to what is going to happen with that. But, in any case, there is really no answer to it, other then you have got to wait and you have to try to find a way to provide that person with some medical services on record and you gotta work and that may be hurting your case. It’s almost like you if you are so disabled that you can’t work even though you can. It’s sad.
Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Well… Jonathan Ginsberg: I do want to make one more comment. When I say two and a half years, that’s not every place in the country. That’s what is going on in Atlanta. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: But it’s not necessarily going on everyplace else. But it can be that long, in fact what they are dong here in Atlanta is they are taking a lot of these cases and they are hearing them and they are having judges in Virginia, West Virginia, Philadelphia actually hear the cases over telecom, where you just have a big TV in the office. I had one of these a couple days ago, where the judge was in Virginia and my client was here and the witness was in Virginia and they had a case heard over video conferencing. That’s something they do to try to speed things up. Brian Therrien: Technology, it’s getting in the game. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, in fact the other thing that they are doing is they are trying to move away from physical paper files to electronic files. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Everything is going to be done on a CD and it’s going to be done that way. Which I welcome because I kind of like the high tech stuff, but again the transition is always problematic, there are always glitches, which is going to be interesting. Brian Therrien: not everybody is computer friendly. Jonathan Ginsberg: Nope, not everybody s and I think…. Brian Therrien: You can see that being a big problem. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, as I said, they moved the initial application for Social Security everything. They try to encourage you to do that online. Just for kicks I went online and had a client that had not applied yet, he tried to apply online and of course, it just hung up right in the middle of it. He got about 45 minutes into it and it just crashed. Social Security’s system was crashed so we had essentially lost 45 pages of work. Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I am not saying that the system doesn’t work; it may have been an unusual situation. Brian Therrien: Yep, yep. So you’ve given a real clear idea of what it takes to be awarded and the time frame and really the situation. And it’s not pretty. But, let’s concentrate on what we can control here. And you’ve done a great thing by putting together this guide So, what I’m hearing here is you want to get the forms, get them filled out right and use the correct terminology. Can you give us a few more tips on, you know, what it is they are looking for and maybe a few things that people would find in the guide that help to address this, so that we can get a better idea? Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, I’ll give you one thing in particular. I tell this to people at my office, and in the guide. When you are filling out an application for benefits, you almost always want to include an alligation of depression. A, because inmost cases it’s kinda hard working throughout your whole life and they no longer can work, there is going ti be an element of depression. It’s very hard to go from being self supporting and supporting your family to being dependant on other people and there is almost always some sort of element of that in a person’s life. More important for Social Security what that does is triggers a psychological evaluation at no cost to you. And I have found many cases where the psychological evaluation generates some limitations, maybe not enough to win a case, but it generates some limitations, again, that might limit the person to simple job instructions, eliminate complex job instructions. It might even identify memory complications. It might identify concentration problems. It almost always helps to some degree. So I tell people when they are filling it out, actually you should get the language to some alleged alligations or some element of depression. That’s one thing that the guide doesn’t say. Brian Therrien: And that’s okay to do? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well again, now obviously f the person clearly says there’s no element at all. I am not depressed at all, because you don’t want to mislead people, but I am telling you from experience, again, I see a lot of people that are, let’s say that a man coming in is forty-eight years old, this is two years old, he has been working his whole life and now because of a bad back he cant support his family. He can’t work. Well, it would be unusual for that person to not have some element of depression. Brian Therrien: Right. Jonathan Ginsberg: This doesn’t mean he cries all the time, or is suicidal; it just means that he has a negative outlook on his future. I think that that sometimes people don’t realize they’ve got it. The spouse can tell, yes there is something that is going on here that has changed. He is not so friendly anymore. He is withdrawn. I think a lot of people deny the existence of it. I just wanted to throw that out there. Brian Therrien: That’s what I’m thinking. Somebody that’s, you know, worked and put myself as best I can in that position, I’m not too psyched about admitting that I am depressed. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, if you think about it, just the whole concept of calling yourself disabled, that word applying to yourself is very, very hard. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I had a client a couple days ago he has his hearing in a couple days and he was from East Virginia and this guy was a welder. He’s been a welder for his whole adult life. He was in his mid forties late forties. He’s been a welder for twenty years, a good one. And now he can’t do that. He has bad back problems, knee problems. Well, he is depressed and even though he has to put a good face on and I want to go back to work, his doctors got him on Prozac and he’s depressed. That’s something that he recognizes, that there is an element of that there and some just don’t realize. Some people take a medication for depression and don’t even realize what it’s for. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: The doctors give it, but I think it’s something to consider strongly. I recommend putting it in there, because if it turns up that you’re not depressed. The psychological evaluation may come back and says that you’re not depressed. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: But more often then not when people go for these psychological evaluations it comes back some of value. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: One thing that I would put in there. The second thing, this is more of a general point, but when filling out the forms, remember that this is about work capacity. So, when you talk about things, let me give you a specific example. Somebody talks about that they’ve got a problem with their back. That they have chronic problems with their back, well, lifting has obviously been and issue. In conversation, I might say to him, I can’t lift very much because my back hurts. Well, not very much doesn’t really say anything, it’s a pretty general term. If however, he says I cant lift more then ten pounds, or I cant carry more then seven or eight pounds. That’s more specific and that can really be applied to a job description. So, I try to tell people in the guide, be very specific when you are talking about things you can measure, like lifting or walking, sitting the time. Just be very, very specific. I realize that they can have good days and bad days but, think about an average day and could you lift a gallon of milk on a repeated basis and if you couldn’t because of a lifting restriction, you can tell. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: And that is a lot better then I can’t lift very much. Or I can’t walk very far. Brian Therrien: Good point. Clearly paints the picture. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s it. It hits the nil on the head. Painting a picture and again, think about it in terms of a person looking, considering a job description that has specific requirements; lifting, carrying, climbing, stooping, all kinds of things like that. Do you have a capacity to perform those tasks at those levels? Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: If you don’t, you want to state the levels that you could do it at. Brian Therrien: Okay. Any other tips or suggestions as far as, what should be included in the information that would be helpful? I know that a lot of this is, well it’s all in the guide. But, anything else? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well again, Social Security is really numbers, so they’ll ask you how long you an do certain things. How long you can walk. A lot of people say to me, well, I don’t know how long I can walk. You have to be able to answer that. As a general rule and let me give you some guidelines. Social Security looks at work capacity in terms of categories of what they call sedentary, light, medium and heavy. And sedentary is basically where you have to be seated for most of the day. And you couldn’t really stand, not necessarily, for more then a couple of hours a day total. A light job might be one that you stand six out of eight hours. So, you have to kinda keep those, I wouldn’t worry about those things too much, just as a general rule. Make sure that your comments don’t show that you are not able to work. You want to focus on your limitations. Sitting, walking, standing, things like that. Every job has those and if you can get passed those, you eliminate a whole category of jobs that limit all light jobs, which is really the test that they use. So focus on the numbers and don’t be a hero. Don’t be overly optimistic; think about what is really real. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Like I can only walk ten steps and I can only lift eight pounds once and I used … Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, you can go further then that. You might say that my situation is such that I go get the mail. The mailbox is maybe twenty yards away. When I go get the mail I have to stop at the mailbox to rest before I come back. You want to be that descriptive on the forms. Like, I go to the grocery store and I have to use the riding cart or I have to rely on the wagon. I can’t carry my groceries out to the car. I carry them in the cart and when I get home I have to have somebody help me get them out. You want to be that descriptive when talking about what you can and cannot do. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Painting a picture. Brian Therrien: Yep. Good. Jonathan Ginsberg: But it’s a good point to stay away from terms like, not very much or I don’t think I can do that or I’m not sure. You want to be definite. You want to say these are the numbers that apply. Brian
Therrien: Excellent advice. So, if somebody
does all this and they go through and they put their best foot forward and
they’ve denied. Do they find out why? Brian Therrien: Basically say that, you know, you say you have missed this. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, you can write the adjudicator, well, actually what I probably would do is getting copies of those documents. You want to build your own file because Social Security has been known to lose files as well. Brian Therrien: Oh boy. Jonathan Ginsberg: You want to have copies of your own records, so then if they loose them for two and a half years, it could be four or five years. I had a case about a month and a half ago, it was five years old and I won the case, but my guy went for five years, before they lost the file. He has to have them rebuild the file. It was fortunate that we had all the record, from the time that I got the case and we built the file. You also want to make sure that all the files are in there. They will say in a form letter that your doctor said X, Y and sometimes they will say that the doctor said X, Y and Z, that is not submission. Again, what they’re saying to you is the doctors didn’t fill out the form properly. Brian Therrien: Okay. Is there a way that somebody could find out the approval statistics for, you know, how many cases there are approved in a certain area based on what the condition was? Is that information out there? Jonathan Ginsberg: That information to my knowledge is not. I have seen statistics about approval rates at the various levels of the adjudication process. So, nationally cases that are just initially approved, there is a certain rate. Major consideration for hearings, so on and so forth. Those statistics are available at the Social Security Website. I’m also seeing specific, and this is only one hearing office, I think it was Texas, where somebody did a study about the approval rate within five judges in that hearing office. It was interesting that they found that the rates range from 60-65%. So some judges were denying most cases, other judges were approving the majority of the cases. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: But I have not seen any kinds of figure that say that a fibro myalgia case has a significant approval for those cases. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: They may disallow that case. Brian Therrien: Yep. You know, in general we hear often that working and communicating and trying to get information from the Social Security office is just politely said, a challenge. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s definitely true. Brian Therrien: Yeah, do you have any suggestions? I mean, people are getting the same answers. They’re not getting answers. A, they’re getting the run around. Their phone calls aren’t answered. The whole, the whole program. Jonathan Ginsberg: You know, I wish I had a good answer for you for that. I think that it’s just that they are overworked and I’ve met a number of the Social Security employees and they are by in large good people and they are trying to do their job, but they’re over worked and they don’t have time to chat. I think some of them re kind of gun-shy as well, because they don’t like to be yelled at by claimants. It’s not the adjudicators fault that the files incomplete. What I do generally, is I communicate mostly in writing. You know, if I’ve got to fax somebody I try to get a direct fax number, I do that. I send mail to try to trouble shoot the questions, that way I can prove they got it. Usually, Social Security is pretty good at putting an acknowledgment that they receive the document, and they will do that. But, as far as communicating with the adjudicator, I generally do it in writing and make sure that the there is a paper trail to follow. Brian Therrien: Okay. Good, so you have a paper trial. Jonathan Ginsberg: Exactly. Brian Therrien: I can see where that would be helpful, if you get on the phone and you get an answer from somebody and then it’s for. Jonathan Ginsberg: In fact, there are two other points I would make. One is; if you have a conversation with an adjudicator or somebody, I would send them a follow-up letter saying this is to confirm our conversation for which we discussed, X, Y, Z. Brian Therrien: Do they use email? Jonathan Ginsberg: You now, I’ve not seen a lot of use of email. I have found that email will work at certain levels, but as a rule, they are not using email. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: They typically want a paper trail. That may change soon with the electronics, but right now they are not sing email for communication to the claimant to my knowledge. Brian Therrien: Okay. All right. Next, very commonly asked and there is a lot of confusion out there, attorney related. You know, the questions are do I need an attorney on the onset. Now we talked about this a little bit and I find it interesting that you’re an attorney and you’re saying, no, you don’t need me now. Right? Jonathan Ginsberg: Right. Well, I like to be straight up with folks and I don’t believe in taking their money if I can’t help them. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: I wont do that so. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: You know, the answer to the question is, that in most cases at the initial part, while you file your application there is not really a whole heck of a lot that an attorney can do. I mean, we can get copies of medical records. But Social Security is going that anyway. We can get forms, that need to be submitted, but again, with the disability guide, you can do that yourself. There is just not a whole lot we can do. Again, our communication with the adjudicators is quite limited and must be done by fax or by form. They really don’t talk to us much. You know, there are some situations where the case is so obvious that the person clearly needs to list things that I will get on the phone and try to get through to the adjudicator and say look at this. I try to save those for the cases that are really deserving of that. And of course, I have a few contacts within the adjudication office if I need to pull some strings, I’ll do that. But, by in large, there’s not a lot we can do. So, I tell people that maybe after you get denied, if you don’t feel comfortable filling out the redetermination form. We will do that for you. Certainly, by the time that they get a hearing, they should have an attorney to go to the hearings with them. But through the initial and recent relations stages, not absolutely necessary, again, the danger is that you don’t want to leave something that is important out and then get to a hearing and have the judge go, well, I have seen this before, it needs to be addressed at the early stages and sends it back. But by in large, most cases, there’s not a whole lot that an attorney can do. I recently told someone that it is their responsibility to make sure those forms are filled out correctly. Brian Therrien: Or find somebody to help them do it. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, and I mean, there are, let me just make a point about this too. Five attorneys supposed to be what they call non-attorney reps to represent people. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay, I am kind of biased, because I am an attorney. I would just say that if you think you might need a non-attorney rep, just be very careful, because as attorneys, we have certain professional obligations to have attorney client confidence and some level of training and the non-attorney reps are not going to have gone through that. Just be careful. I’m sure the non-attorney reps are pretty good. I’ve seen several that are pretty rotten, so just be careful. Brian Therrien: Okay, so let’s go back through this. So, what is being suggested Jonathan is that if somebody comes to you at the onse4t and says listen, here you can get this book, you can fill out the forms, you can work your way through and submit these forms properly and get all the way up to a hearing and by making that move they’ll save money. Jonathan Ginsberg: Correct. Brian Therrien: Okay and they’ll save money because they wouldn’t have had to pay you? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well right. Brian Therrien: As a lawyer or anywhere. Jonathan Ginsberg: Right. When the attorneys get paid, we get paid 25% of the detached due benefits, so again, realize the cases are taking two and half years to work through. So lets say that it takes a year or two to work through these initial complications for consideration and you can go back a year. In fact, let’s say that there is two years of back due benefits and their benefit is $1000 a month. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s $24,000, so 25% of $24,000 and most fee agreements are going to be limited to $5000 and that’s going to cost you five grand. So, if it is something that you can do yourself, pay yourself $5,000. Brian Therrien: Okay, but they still need to have a lawyer, as you suggest at a hearing, right? Jonathan Ginsberg: Correct, that’s correct. Brian Therrien: So would that same 25% rule apply? Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes, basically the way fee’s work with attorneys, we are allowed to do what I called a pre-agreement that provides that we are paid 25% of past due benefits up to $5,300, that’s as far up as it goes. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: No matter what stage we win it at. So, if I got involved in the case at a weeks duration and I won it there I get 25% or the $5,000. So I would like to thank you if you could go through some of the step that I would go through. These are not really heavy duty legal arguments, its just he forms. Brian Therrien: Forms. Jonathan Ginsberg: Then you can save yourself up to $5,000. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Right off. I mean, is it worth a try. Again, not everybody is committed to draw up the form correctly and need help. But why not try that, since there is not a whole lot of difference we can make as attorneys. It’s just a waste of time, in most cases, because it’s something you can do yourself, go for it. Brian Therrien: So okay. Let me make sure I get this then. Fill out the forms, go through the process, see if you can get awarded, okay? Now if they can’t get awarded they can request a hearing. Right? Jonathan Ginsberg: Correct. B; Okay. So, give it your best shot, use the guide. Give it your best shot, see what you can do. It’s a process your going to go through anyway. Jonathan Ginsberg: Right. Brian Therrien: And if they win, save up the $5,000 bucks. Okay? I got that. And if they can’t win on that process, then they request a hearing and once they get a hearing, it is your suggestion, that at that point at time, they should not go into court alone, they should go in represented with a lawyer. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, I always say that they should get an attorney the minute they request a hearing. Here’s why. Number one I think that the attorney is probably the best person to fill out the hearing application. For the most point, we can look through and make sure they have included all of their alligations of disability and if we have to add something at that point, we can do that. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: You don’t want to wait until the day before. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Number two; is that as an attorney, once the case typically moves from the state agency to adjudication through the Social Security office of Appeals and at the office appearance and appeals we give an OHA. They don’t have any personnel to develop the medical records, so the claimant or the attorney is totally responsible to develop that medical record. So if that file sits there for a year and a half and nobody has added any medical records to it by the time it gets to a judge. Its way out of date. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: And I don’t want to get to the point where you call me up a week before the hearing and say can you represent me, and I discover that I’ve got a couple months worth of work to do to get that file up to date, I’m not going to be able to help them very much. Brian Therrien: Right, right. Jonathan Ginsberg: So the best thing to do, I think, when it is out for reconsideration, I think that is the time to get an attorney. I want to make something clear, when I said that we get paid 25% that is contingency fee, if we don’t win the case, we don’t get paid anything. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: It’s important to realize that if you hire an attorney, Social Security pays no fee unless you win. Brian Therrien: Do we know how many cases are approved before, without going through this? Getting denied and going through the reconsideration stage? Jonathan Ginsberg: I don’t have any, there are numbers out there, I don’t have them handy. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: I wouldn’t want to guess at that. Brian Therrien: Okay, but there is a chance. Jonathan Ginsberg: There is a chance and you know, a good number of cases are approved at the listing point. That’s when most of the cases are approved. So when I see a case that comes to me for a hearing and it’s a listing level case, what that says to me is that somebody didn’t get the right forms to the office. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: So by in large as a rule,. Listing normal cases, should be approved early, because that tis what the adjudicators are trying to do. Brian Therrien: If they have their forms filled out right. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s correct. Brian Therrien: This is great, boy. Good information. Okay, so we understand when somebody should get an attorney and why okay. And that’s if they have been denied and they get a hearing. Jonathan Ginsberg: Typically after the reconsideration denial. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: If they’ve applied by themselves and they get denied and they want to file reconsideration on their own and they get denied there, they have 60 days to file for a hearing and that’s when you should really start looking into having an attorney. Brian Therrien: Okay, how do they find one? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well… Brian Therrien: Let’s say that somebody is up here in Vermont where I am and, you know, it’s a long way for you. Jonathan Ginsberg: Right. Well, I hear its very nice up there, I might like visiting Vermont. But you can look on the internet; it’s a good place to look. I think you’ve got a link to a pretty good referral service Brian Therrien: Yep. Jonathan Ginsberg: One of the things that I’ve done over the years is I’ve gotten a lot of attorneys throughout the country in this book and I do a lot of speaking about this and I’ve made a lot of book contacts, so I‘ve set up a little referral service with people that I have met over the year, there is a link to that on the website. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I think that you should look at the websites o many attorneys and see what they have to say and you know, and fit yourself with the person that has the most confidence and experience. With Social Security more so then a lot of the other areas of Law, it’s a lot about who you know. It’s a lot about proper levels of process, being very comfortable with going to court and making a compelling argument. Because judges sense when you are prepared or not and it makes a big difference to have an attorney who is prepared and understands what is it h is trying to prove. It’s funny, a lot of the attorneys that I work with, I’ve looked at some of their files, from some of the cases in Georgia and I’ll look at them and they are really, really organized, you can tell that’s a winning case. You appreciate the work they do to make your life easier. You go into a hearing; you cannot say to the judge, well, I am missing the last year and a half of records, that’s the reason to be there. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: And every case often you have a form missing, one or more forms that you will have to illicit. Those are the things that experience shows that every judge have their own issues too, things they prefer to have present at the hearing. Brian Therrien: Hmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: There are a couple of judges in Atlanta that love prejudgement so if I have those judge, I’m doing prejudgement, so it’s just a matter of just knowing how to interpret. Brian Therrien: Yeah and yes on our site, somebody can go through and click and request and go through the network. Now, in looking at the network that’s been put together and the network that has been put together by you, I would expect that you have, you’ve put the people that if you cant represent them and they are represented by someone in Des Moines, Iowa, you put them through some level of scrutiny, I would expect. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely, first I make sure that they’re insured. If a malpractice suit turns up and we have a long discussion about their experience, how long they’ve done it. I think all of these folks have done it, I think there is maybe one that hasn’t done it for ten year’s, most of them have ten years or more. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: I can tell, if you talk to enough people and you can tell just by discussing, like the discussion we are having today, f they do a lot of this stuff and they understand the process, then you can tell. Brian Therrien: Okay. Especially after this interview. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah. Absolutely. Brian Therrien: Okay, good, so that is how somebody can learn and find an attorney to represent them. Let’s skip back to the book and the resources, fine resources that you provide to people. You know, there are other categories like, widow seeking pensions and veterans seeking benefits. Does the guide help with this? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, widow’s benefits are actually a function of Title II disability. Basically Widows benefits, a widow or widower for that matter who is over the age of 50,if they become disabled within 7 years of their spouses death, thy can claim benefits based on their spouses earning record, so it’s really the same issues as the Title II claimants. It’s just a qualification of how old the person is and how recent their spouse passed away. Brian Therrien: So over fifty, disabled within seven years and their benefits would be based in their spouse’s income. Jonathan Ginsberg: Correct, but this is designed to give classification. It could be a homemaker, a woman who’s a homemaker. Her husband worked and she took care of the kids, he passes away, let’s say at age 45 and at age 51, she becomes disabled, she can qualify for benefits based on his income. Brian Therrien: And the guide would help with this. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, it’s the same form. Brian Therrien: Okay, perfect. How about veterans? Jonathan Ginsberg: Veterans disability is completely different then Social Security. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: I will tell you though, with one mention to veterans. One is, if somebody has been approved for Veterans benefits. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: That is actually very good evidence on a Social Security form. A disabled veteran who has worked and applied for disability, and they become disabled, additional disabled in some other fashion, they could use their veterans findings as evidence and Social Security will consider that very heavily. That is something that is very important for veterans to know. Second thing really is the intent written by the Veterans Administration, to study whether or not they were going to offer that benefit, Veterans and Social Security, if you got one you couldn’t get both. You’d get the higher of the two. That didn’t go anywhere, so Veterans benefits at this point are safe. At least from the veteran’s perspective, they will not offset VA benefits or whatever you come with to Social Security. Social Security has the same policies that the disabled veterans get. The Veterans benefits you also get your Social Security. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: But there has been some talk about changing that, but it has not happened. I would encourage everybody, the veterans to notify his or her representative that they want to notify his or her representative of their intention. Brian Therrien: Good. They deserve their benefits. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely, they served heir country and they deserve their benefits. Brian Therrien: Yes. Thank you. Children? Jonathan Ginsberg: Definitely. Brian Therrien: Walk us through, does the guide work for children? Is it the same criteria? Tell us a little bit about that Jonathan? Jonathan Ginsberg: Children have a different book actually. I’ve got a different book called the Child entry guide to SSI for two reasons. One is the standard, because children are very different, and the forms are different. So it is a totally different book. Generally for children, what has happened in the last ten years or so is moved away from a review that kind of looks at functional capacity, but really starts to apply to children. They moved away from that, now they have kind of look for a listing. So, children really what we are looking at is do they meet any listings. Because there are different level of children’s cases based on the child. Obviously a young child it would not be significant to have certain tests done, school tests or medical tests. But as they get older, the tests change. But basically what you are looking for is do they meet a listing and so what the focus of the Child Listing Guide is for people to fill out the forms with the listing requirements, because a lot of the child listing cases that I see, I don’t come through a lot of them, but the ones that I do see are ADHD or ADD stuff like that and there are some very specific medical listing terminology that you would want to use and I give some examples on how to do that. But primarily with a child, it depends on age. Brian Therrien: Okay. So, let’s say that a child has a listing and benefits are awarded in their situation gets worse, is this a case where they would go back and use the guide that you have or…. Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, I mean if they become an adult. My guide only applies to adults for the answer guide. The SSI guide would be more applicable for those applying on behalf of the child. So if they get denied, for what they are applying for, they’ll want the guide of how to fill out the child forms. Brian Therrien: Okay, let’s say that the child is two and at age two they had a certain level of a disability, but at age four it got worse. Jonathan Ginsberg: Okay, well again, that’s something that I guess the question was were the denied early on or are they applying now. Brian Therrien: Well, they were awarded, somebody’s receiving benefits but their case got worse, in going back to my question Jonathan, would somebody need to go back in to the guide that you have to address the situation that their child’s case has gotten worse? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well again, as long as they meet the threshold for disability, getting worse is not going to change the amount of money they get or anything like that. Brian Therrien: I see. Jonathan Ginsberg: So once they prove that. I will tell you that child cases, Social Security is fairly quick for what they call doing a disability review. Which mans they will look at the child’s progress over the next two or three years after being awarded and see if the child has improved and if the continued disability review indicates that the child has improved, then Social Security might even cut the child off, in which case, you would have to go through the reconsideration phase and go through the whole process again which my Child Guide could walk you through as well. Brian Therrien: Okay. Now, and back with SSDI, the amount that was awarded was based on income, a thousand to eighteen hundred dollars was the general category that we talked about. Jonathan Ginsberg: It’s based on what they paid in. Brian Therrien: What they paid in, okay. So in this case with children they haven’t worked, what’s it based on? Jonathan Ginsberg: It’s statutory what SSI will pay. Brian Therrien: Oh, it is. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes. Brian Therrien: Okay. Jonathan Ginsberg: Child cases almost always go, it’s a very rare case to be declined SSI is different then the statutory amount, it is subsidized by the government. Brian Therrien: Okay and the disability answer guide for children is based on the same concept where you’ve taken the forms and walked people through, just like your sitting right next to them so that it is filled out, correct? Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s correct. Brian Therrien: Okay, great. Jonathan Ginsberg: One difference, I will say is the disability answer guide, the adult version also comes with an audio CD. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: Where I basically discuss the disability process and discuss a lot of things about procedure. I talk a lot about the process and just give some verbal instructions. The Child SSI guide I have not done that. I’ve got it in writing, as it is kind of written transcript if you will. In order to keep costs down, I did not put that into an audio format. Brian Therrien: Okay. Well, at least they the information is available, that’s key. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yes. Brian Therrien: Good. Let’s go back to the adult version of the guide here, you know, I have gone through this a bunch of times but this is just critical information. Let’s just recap what the value is in having the guide and how it can help people as we get ready to wrap up here. Jonathan Ginsberg: All right. Well, the big picture of value I think is not having to do it on one sheet of paper. Social Security has it’s own sort of terminology. It’s own way of doing things and if you aren’t really clued into that, it’s really hard to fill out the forms. So what I really tried to do is figure out is knowing what I know and I have tried lots and lots of cases and dealt with lots and lots of clients and knowing what I know, how would I fill out the forms if I had the disability myself. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: So I’ve used that kind of approach so that I am really translating them, speaking their language, because again, Social Security, it goes back to vocational issues. Here’s a simple way to look at it. The disability application, what you’re doing is translating medical findings with very specific work limitations. So in other words, you’re taking a medical diagnosis and you’re finding out what specifically that means in terms of a persons capacity to work. So I give examples of how you actually do that. I remind people to be specific not to use the general; I can’t walk very far, I can’t lift very much. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I give examples of how to fill out the questions because again, some of these questions, they ask the same question over and over and over. So if they just want to copy what I have said, I think this is a starting point. It’s very intimidating to look at a white piece of paper, if you already have something together next to you to fill it out, it can give you some sort of comfort level and give you a certain feeling that maybe you are heading down the right path. If you are thinking about answer questions a certain way and I’ve done it totally different, you have something to judge it with, because it is very, very difficult to answer the questions if you have no perspective on them at all. Of course, most people who are applying are not professionals, and they may just read the questions entirely different. We are hoping this will take care of that problem. Brian Therrien: Sure, sure. We’ve been asked by several of our members, is there a place where all these forms are in one easy to use and understand location and you must have been reading minds when you put this together, because that’s what we’ve been asked. Jonathan Ginsberg: I’ll say something else, I mentioned going to electronic forms, which has even got more confusing. The paper form is still there on the website and unless you know the exact address, the URL, you can’t even get there. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Instead of having a drop down menu, they aren’t even there anymore or the form shows up on the website. So, as I said if you’re doing this electronically, you don’t even have the luxury of having the full format in front of you. You have to answer questions as they come and that’s very, very hard to do. It kind of brings back memories of school of standardized tests, where you had to take the test in a time frame, you are under a lot of pressure and it’s very hard to do., Brian Therrien: Yeah, and looking at your guide I see you’ve out it in a nice big format, big pages, big print. Jonathan Ginsberg: Right, it’s bound so you can open it flat. Brian Therrien: Yeah. That was good to do that, very nice. So, excellent. Well, again what I see and what I’ve learned today, is somebody can come and they can get the guide and they can go through the process. They stand a chance of winning it on their own by filling out the forms right and they can avoid having to pay that 25% of back benefits. Jonathan Ginsberg: Exactly. Brian Therrien: Yes. Jonathan Ginsberg: One other final point is, I think that some people are asking, well is it worth getting this thing, even if I don’t end up at a hearing, you know I’ve got a physician where my doctors is not real, real supportive, or I don’t think I’m going to have enough to win. One of the advantages of having a file processed early on is some judges when they look at the files, they are looking for very specific things stating factually. So when I go to a hearing, I’ve got a form filled out, a functional capacity form filled out by a doctor that’s dated two months ago, that really does not speak to this persons condition two years ago. Obviously, I want to document as far back with my client as I can go. If I’ve got a form filled out by a doctor that is dated two years ago, that is supportive of me. Again, the guide tells you how to do that. Then I’m increasing my odds of getting my back benefits received way further back. So it’s a real good tool to build the file going backwards as well, because obviously people are going to get these past due benefits. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: They need t be aware that the judges can amend onset, if you say that you became disabled in December of 2003, but the medical evidence is not really crucial until may of 2005, well, you may lose those two years of past due benefits. But if you’ve got the right forms filled out that go back to that 2003 date, then your chances of getting those back benefits becomes much more greater. Brian Therrien: That’s two years of benefits, that’s critical. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, so that can be thousands and thousands of dollars. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: So I tell people that even if you don’t get approved, you’re going a long way of building the file so that when the attorney does get it, his job is a lot easier. Brian Therrien: Yep. Jonathan Ginsberg: And the judges job is a lot easier, that increases your odds for the judge to cut you back benefits. Some judges, their feeling is if it’s on the record on a certain date, I don’t even have to, like if you have a MRI exam that show a herniated disk on June 1, their attitude is I don’t think it existed on May 31. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s pretty harsh, but that’s what they do. You have to document the fact that this was what my doctor was saying back then two years ago, then your back benefits should be there. I don’t think I emphasize that enough, how important it is that your records are consistent from the time that you may have become disabled until the time that you have your doctors fill out the forms.
Brian Therrien: Yep, good. Now I know we are just about out of time and I want to make sure that we cover these last few things. Speaking of ads, let’s say, somebody comes through, they get the book, and they understand that they can win it on their own and save thousands of dollars and they don’t like it, do you offer any type of guarantee or money back program? Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah basically, I have a money back program, that if they don’t like it, they just ask for a refund no questions ask. Brian Therrien: really? Jonathan Ginsberg: I have had maybe one or two a year. But I feel, that I have put a lot of time and effort and it’s pretty good. If its not going to help them just send it back in the same condition, no harm no foul. Brian Therrien: That’s great. Now, a few other things I wanted to mention, in addition to this wonderful guide for adults and children, you have other resources that are out there. You kind of provide an online legal council with this Social Security blog, can you tell us about that? Jonathan Ginsberg: Sure, I’ve got a blog, basically for those of you who don’t know what it is, a blog is essentially a website, but it’s interactive. I can post some information and people can comment, I am going to take it one step further where I solicit questions to people and I get lots and lots of them and I try to answer those questions. Of course, the blog categorizes it, so it’s become a fairly comprehensive resource. I think you’ve got a link to the blog on the website. Brian Therrien: Yep. Jonathan Ginsberg: But I invite you to visit my blog, the ask questions section. I cant answer every one of them, but I try to pick the ones that I think are the most universal, the most relevant and I answer the questions on my own. If I don’t know the answer I will look it up and find that information for you. But I do that as a way to chart progress to find out answers to things that I didn’t necessarily know. Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Also, keep track of what is going on out there. I am getting a lot of people, not just claimants, from other attorneys. One of the things about a blog is you can subscribe to it and if you use a personalized yahoo page or MSN or AOL, you can put a little button there and subscribe to it and therefore anything that comes out of the blog you can get a copy of it sent to email. Brian Therrien: Really? Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, it’s a nice little resource and it doesn’t cost anything and it’s just a way for me to keep my finger on the pulse of what people want to know. I do that to add to the guide when I need to add additional information and of course its all out there in the blog. Brian Therrien: So you’re a unique lawyer. You’re telling people that they don’t need you when the start from the onset, first of all and here’s the guide you can do it on your own and you’ll answer their questions. Jonathan Ginsberg: Yeah, like I said, I don’t have time for every single question but sure… Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: I think that part of it is I’m fortunate t have a good education. I’ve got a good practice, why not give back a little bit. Brian Therrien: Yeah, that’s great. Jonathan Ginsberg: More people should, I mean it’s that whole karma thing, what comes around goes around. Brian Therrien: Hmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: I try to help a good part of the people and f course the people that need this information but don’t have the money to pay the attorneys fees, lets not shout about it, lets find a way to work it out. Brian Therrien: Right. That’s exactly right. One other nice resource you have, and this is the last one, but you’ve got a state by state guide so somebody that is new Hampshire and they want to look up information specific to that, they can go onto this site and put in the state and also put in their specific condition and it will kind of customize it. That’s a great resource. How did you come up with what idea? Jonathan Ginsberg: Well, I think with the condition. What I’ve got is a little drop down, so I highlight the most common conditions that I see. So for example if somebody has a fibro myalgia issue, then I basically have a little section about a fibro myalgia case or cardiac problem cases. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s a logical thing because I tell everybody when they come in, they are not looking for general information, they want to know how they can win their own case. So, you know, if somebody has a particular medical problem, this is how it will be approached by the state in general. Now the state might say, now this is how to put the information. That’s why I keep adding to it as I do more research about it. But it gives the phone numbers and the addresses for example, if they need to mail in a medical record to an adjudicator, here’s the address to where the adjudicator’s office is. If they have hearing coming up they can find out which hearing office would be covering where they live. So if they need to make plans for travel or whether it can be done by video. It just gives them a little more information, a little more background information. Brian Therrien: Do you accept contributions? So the person in New Hampshire spots a good resource, thought it might be valuable, can they submit it and say; hey Jonathan here’s this. Jonathan Ginsberg: Absolutely, as a matter of fact, what I have been doing is using the attorneys in my referral list and I talk to them and try to get ideas from them as to what’s going on in their neck of the woods. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: Try to add that to it, so that if a claimant has, or if somebody has had the experience, I actively look at that and I will put it in the blog and I’ll add that to the website as well. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: I do all of this myself, so I can edit it and do it in a matter of minutes, if there is something to fix, tell me that too and I’ll fix it. Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: So yeah, they could certainly do that. Brian Therrien: That’s great. Jonathan Ginsberg: One of the things, one of my newest projects is an internet radio program. I am not sure if we talked about that or not. But that will be a link on your site as well. Brian Therrien: Yes. Jonathan Ginsberg: I’ve set up a little, it’s kind of an offshoot of a blog, an internet radio show where I answer questions about disabilities and do interviews with people, that haven’t been around it too much. But some people prefer to hear it in the audio version, as opposed to the written form, so the questions have a little more nuance to them, I will answer on the radio program. It’s really a pod cast, that they can rip or download and they can learn about the various issues. Brian Therrien: That’s a great idea. You’ve really provided some super resources, so just to recap. We’ve got the adult disability guide, the children’s disability guide and then you run blog and then there’s the nice resource where somebody can zero in state by state, also on that site, or also you provide a service, you’ll find on our site as well, where you can find a lawyer in your local area. If someone is not in Atlanta, right? Jonathan Ginsberg: Right. Brian Therrien: And then the last is the radio station. Great idea. Have we missed anything? Jonathan Ginsberg: I think we’ve got it all right now. The latest thing that I am working on, I am trying to do some websites that are regarding some specific medical problems, so that we can have more discussion about various medical issues. I’ve kind of adopted those over the summer, so the first one is not yet, it’s almost done. That will be the next thing, again I think people read up about the medical problems and how they might approach that. It’s good information to have. The more you can educate yourself about this, the better. Realize, if somebody applies for disability, they are entering a whole new world. They are entering a world that is built on forms and adjudication. It’s just a whole different world. You’ve got to educate yourself on how that world works, in terms of what to say and how to say it and the though process that is used by the people making the decisions. What I try to do is give you a little bit of an idea of how to play it back to them. Brian Therrien: Mmhmm. So to recap, understand the game, right? Jonathan Ginsberg: You got it. Brian Therrien: File the forms right, get the guide, file the forms as per the guide and start talking their language. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s exactly right. Brian Therrien: Get the guide and go it on your own and see if you can win the case on your own and save yourself a bunch of money. If you cant do it that way and you have to go and it ends up at a hearing, and you have got to go see a judge, don’t go into court on your own at that point and time, come back to the website or come see you and then at that point in time, get a lawyer, right? Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s exactly right. Brian Therrien: That’s the name of the game. Jonathan Ginsberg: Knowing again, how to explain and being an educated participant is very helpful. Otherwise, you’ll just get run over. It’s really sad when I see people who are deserving, clearly disabled, who don’t get approved, because they didn’t do the right thing, the forms not right, they didn’t get the right attorney. Didn’t get an attorney at all. It’s very disheartening. Brian Therrien: And it’s a costly mistake. Jonathan Ginsberg: It’s a very costly mistake, especially people who have paid into the system. You’ll see people, because I’ll get cases, every once in a while that have a feel for someone that has lost at the hearing level and they are getting ready for an appeal and the next level of appal you add another two years to that. I look at the file and I see that this is a case that should have been won, that wasn’t won because it wasn’t done right. Brian Therrien: Mmmm. Jonathan Ginsberg: That’s very, very disheartening. What do you say? Brian Therrien: Yeah. Jonathan Ginsberg: We will try to fix it, but it’s going to be hard. Brian Therrien: So get the guide. Jonathan Ginsberg: Should have got the guide. Brian Therrien: {laughter] Listen, you’ve been generous with your time today, generous with all of your contributions to this effort that you’ve put out in and on the web there and I want to thank you. It’s been wonderful. I appreciate your time. Jonathan Ginsberg:
I appreciate the opportunity to talk.
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