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Video Transcript
Hello, this is Darrell Castle and I’m an attorney licensed to practice law in the state of Tennessee and on this video, I want to try to explain to you why you need an attorney for your appeal in a Social Security Disability case.
Let’s say that you file an application for Social Security Disability Insurance, and as virtually everyone is, you were turned down the first time. Well that is a good explanation for why you need a lawyer on appeal.
If you really want to get disability and you feel that you’re qualified – you’re disabled – and you have a doctor who is willing to back you up on that. In other words, your doctor is supportive of your application for disability. In a vast amount of times, you will be denied for Disability on your first application – the one you do yourself.
So, you can hire an attorney to represent you on appeal for a very small amount of money. Nothing comes from your future ongoing benefits, only your past-due benefits. And then, it’s only a small-percentage of your past-due benefits. It’s limited to a total recovery of about $6,000. In other words, even if the percentage exceeds $6,000, your attorney is limited to that much money.
The attorney is absolutely necessary for you to have success in your Social Security Disability application. And the cost is very little, so it’s kind of a no-brainer.
Why is it really necessary? Because you’re going to have to do an appeal of your Disability hearing that is going to have to bring the doctor’s statement in line with what the Disability statute requires. Doctors write their reports (they’re well-meaning but they’re not lawyers) and they don’t know how to match their report with what the disability statue says. A lawyer does know that.
So, he can work with the doctor to make his medical report – not change the report but make it line up with the statue – so it reads correctly in the statutory languages.
You need all of that and you can get it with very little costs.
So, when you’re denied Disability, you have 60 days to file an appeal – 60 days, folks – from the time you get that denial letter. If you do this, then you’ll probably be successful.