What You Need To Know About The Appeals Council If Your Social Security Disability Claim Is Denied

If your Social Security Disability claim is denied by the Administrative Law Judge you have a difficult decision to make. The Social Security Administration will give you 30 days to appeal to the Appeals Council or file a new Social Security Disability claim asking for benefits from the date of the Administrative Law Judge’s denial forward.

By filing a new claim for Social Security Disability benefits you give up the back benefits from the time of your initial application until the time of the Administrative Law Judge’s decision. That can be a significant amount of Social Security benefits.

On the other hand, the Appeals Council is just not a friendly

place for Social Security Disability applicants whose claims have been denied.

Statistics About the Appeals Council in 2013

The appeals council processed 176,251 requests for review and the average time for the Appeals Council to make a decision was 364 days.

The Appeals Council will not take new testimony and simply reviews the Administrative Law Judge’s decision and the record to determine whether the Judge has made an error of law.

According to the statistics, over 76.87% of Administrative Law Judge’s denials were upheld and only 17.11% were remanded to the Administrative Law Judge. Less than 1.45% of decisions were found to be fully favorable.

These are awful statistics!

Making a difficult decision

If your claim for Social Security Disability has been denied, you’ll have to make a difficult decision about whether you want to appeal to the Appeals Council or start all over. Certainly, these statistics don’t bode well if you choose to appeal to the Appeals Council.

You should contact experienced Appeals Council attorney Nancy Cavey for advise as to how to proceed if your claim for Social Security Disability benefits is denied by the Administrative Law Judge. Give us a call today at 727-894-3188 to discuss your options!