Monday, March 2, 2015

Check Your Social Security Earnings Before You File for SSDI

Last week, I had the pleasure of representing two ladies who found out, late in the the Social Security Disability process, that not all their employment earnings were being counted towards their benefit amount.  Finding out that not all the earnings were being considered for benefits purposes was a little bit disconcerting, since both of them had a very good earnings record.  One of them had worked for the Puerto Rico Police Department and the other one had worked for the Springfield Board of Education. It turns out, that neither employer made contributions to Social Security (paid FICA Taxes).  
In an ideal scenario, it would have been much better if we had known ahead of time exactly what our client's earning record was and what was the exact amount of SSD benefits that they would be receiving in case of a favorable decision.  Moreover, I believe that it is also a good idea to check my client's record early on in order to determine whether there are any errors in the earning record.  
My suggestion to all my readers is that we should all periodically check our Social Security earnings. Imagine waiting until you are ready to retire or you are to sick to work, to find out that your earnings were not properly recorded by a mistake from the SSA or from your employer.
Another problem is that it is difficult for your Social Security Disability Lawyer to get your earnings record.  To be able to get it on-line, one has to go through a long series of security questions, in order to protect the confidentiality of the records.  For this reason, I encourage all of my clients to get their own record electronically.  To check you Social Security record, you can go online to:
http://www.socialsecurity.gov/myaccount 
I already checked mine :)  Good luck!