HAS YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY DISABIILTY COVERAGE EXPIRED?

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) only covers insured workers.  You become insured by working the required number of quarters and paying FICA tax by payroll deduction--which is really Social Security and Medicare tax.  Like all insurance, SSDI has a beginning date and an ending date, which most people are not aware of.

I am looking at my homeowners insurance policy, for example.  My coverage on my home began February 13, 2018 and will expire February 12, 2019 at midnight--unless it is renewed.  To renew it, I must pay the 2019 premium.  If I don't pay the premium, I will no longer have insurance on my home.

Social Security disability (SSDI) works the same way in principle.  The date your SSDI coverage expires is called your Date Last Insured (DLI).  It's one of the first things Social Security decision makers will look at when deciding if you can qualify for a benefit or payment.

If I want to file a successful claim on my homeowners insurance, I must prove that I suffered a loss while my policy was still in force. 

To be covered (insured) for SSDI, a general rule of thumb is:  You must have worked 5 out of the past 10 years, or earned 20 quarters of work coverage out of the past 40 quarters.  You must have contributed FICA taxes during these quarters to be covered.  The specific number of credits you need varies according to your age.

How do you find out if you have enough work credits to be covered?  The best way is to call your local Social Security office and ask.  The two questions you want to ask are:

(1)  Do I have enough work credits to be covered by SSDI?

(2)  When is my Date Last Insured (DLI)?  In other words, when will I stop being covered?

A DLI in the past is called a "remote DLI" and can make the claim difficult to win because you must prove that you became disabled prior to the DLI.  The further in the past your DLI is, the harder it is to win an SSDI claim.  If you are diagnosed with a new, disabling medical condition AFTER the DLI, Social Security will not consider it.  (It would be like my house burning AFTER my insurance policy expired).  Also, if your medical condition worsens after your Date Last Insured, Social Security will not consider it.  They only consider your medical condition prior to your DLI, not after.

I urge people to apply for SSDI benefits as soon as they believe their medical condition makes them unable to work.  Once the application has been filed, you are given a "protected filing date."   It doesn't matter if your SSDI coverage expires after you have filed a claim.  It will still be processed.  But there is real danger in waiting too long to file your claim.  Filing a new claim after your Date Last Insured is never a good thing.

So, here is what you should come away with in this brief tutorial about DLI:

1)  You must have accumulated enough recent work credits to have SSDI coverage. 

2)  You should file your new SSDI claim before your Date Last Insured, that is, before your Social Security disability coverage expires.

Note:  SSDI coverage usually expires about 5 years after you stop working and paying FICA tax into the system.  So if a worker with a long work history stops working in 2015, his Date Last Insured will probably be sometime in 2020. At that point he becomes uninsured for any Social Security disability benefit. This can vary from worker to worker.

There are a lot of other technical matters that must be considered when determining whether a person has a viable SSDI claim.  It is not as simple as whether your or disabled or not.  You can certainly be disabled and yet not eligible for a benefit.

A good Social Security disability attorney or advocate will look into all the technical aspects of a claim and advise you of problems you may encounter.  It is true that you must have medical evidence to prove that you are disabled.  In addition, however, you must also prove that you meet the technical rules of eligibility.
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Charles W. Forsythe
7027 Old Madison Pike - Suite 108
Huntsville, AL 35806
"The Social Security Firm"

CALL US:  (256) 799-0297

EMAIL ME:   forsythefirm@gmail.com