Making a Claim for Disability Insurance Benefits

If you have been injured on the job or as the result of an illness, and the result of that injury or illness is that you are no longer able to work as you had been previously, you will want to file a disability claim with either the Social Security Administration or your private disability insurance provider.  The process for filing a disability claim to obtain disability insurance benefits is similar whether you are filing through SSA or through a disability provider, and many disability providers will check if your injury or illness would better qualify you for SSA benefits as opposed to private benefits as part of the filing process.  In order to file your claim, you will want to follow certain steps to make sure it is done in a timely and correct fashion.

Filing a Disability Insurance Benefits Claim

You can file a claim either by:

• Visiting the Social Security office in your local area,
• By calling a toll free number to reach the Social Security Administration, or
• In some cases by filing the claim online through SSA’s website. 

Certain types of claims such as SSI claims are not available to be filed online, so you will need to make sure that the type of claim you are filing can be completed properly on the web if you are planning to take that route.

The Claims Process

After you have filed the initial claim, you will be contacted and interviewed by a representative from the Social Security office.  Once that has been completed, they will forward your file to a state disability claims examiner, who will check your case and determine whether or not your disability will qualify for SSA benefits. 

Some qualification factors which will be examined are:

• Whether or not the injury or illness has significantly impacted your ability to work over a period of 12 months or more, as well as
• Your employment history over as many as the last fifteen years,
• The type of work you do, and
• The way in which your illness or disability has impacted your ability to do this type of work.

Getting Help

After the disability examiner makes the final determination about your eligibility for benefits, you will receive a benefit verification letter.  If your claim is denied, you will have up to 60 days to appeal the claim through the mail, and begin the review process.  This is similar to the review process which most private disability insurers will use as well.  Contacting a lawyer may help if you feel your claim has been wrongfully denied. A lawyer can also help you throughout the application process to maximize your chances of the claim being approved.