Government Peon
Metropolis, US
Female, 45
Sorry about that hiatus - I got sidetracked in life, but I'm back!
I work in the largest Social Security office in my area, working primarily with disabled individuals, but I have my hands in all aspects of what our agency does. Retirement, disability, survivors, SSN cards, the whole shebang.
I love what I do, and do my best to juggle the work which is far too much for one person to complete. I work with other hard workers, and some who are just taking up space.
Again, sorry for the long wait for an answer!
In my office, all of the area funeral homes fax over a form called an SSA-721 Funeral Director's Notification of Death on everyone who comes through their doors.
Other times, people call in and let us know that their family members have died - if they were receiving benefits, we suspend them until we have actual proof.
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First of all, you're not necessarily entitled to disability at all; this is one of the biggest misunderstandings in my opinion. Assuming you've been paying SS taxes and are eligible by non-medical standards, they will then evaluate your case by looking at multiple factors: age, education, and work history.
You may never be able to work construction again, but based on your background, you may reasonably be expected to work a desk job. Another person may not have that same history, and their case may be decided differently.
Example - I took a claim from a 26 year old hairdresser who had to have one of her hands amputated - pretty difficult to style hair one-handed! She was denied based on the fact that she had a basic college education and it was reasonably plausible for her to 'start over' at her age.
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I don't think I've ever worked with anyone who was outright committing fraud - usually they just try to underestimate their earnings, or 'fib' about receiving a non-covered pension (pension based on work that paid into a private pension plan INSTEAD of paying SS taxes - their benefits are computed differently). Bummer is, yes, we'll pay them, but then later when they aren't working anymore, guess what? Whoops, we found out, and now they owe us money back, and our first line of recoup is to withhold payments.
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In a word, yes. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you how the whole process works. If we become aware of a potentially fraudulent situation, it is not something that is dealt with in the local Field Office. We make a referral to the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) whenever we suspect fraud. They have detectives who investigate the allegations and pursue criminal charges when appropriate!
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I hear you - I'm pretty heavily conservative myself... if you think about it, most of todays Republicans are more liberal than the Dems of old!!
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I thought and thought and thought about this, then forgot about Jobstr and just now spent 15 minutes trying to remember my login, which email address I used, etc.
I still don't have an answer. I find all of it fairly appalling - people stealing from their fellow man is reprehensible!
One I recently heard about a woman who receives disability, her kids receive SSI (kid's welfare disability), she was working part time, getting paid by the State for being her mother's PCA - it turns out that she wasn't even living in the same state as her mother. They were both charged with multiple counts of fraud against not only SSA but the individual states as well as Medicaid fraud.
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Sometimes I think so too, but I don't make the medical decisions so my opinion doesn't count to the big guys upstairs.
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