How long before disability starts in NC if you are approved?

by Tim Moore. Free Case Evaluation here.

Here’s the short answer to the question, based on my experience as a disability claims examiner. If you are approved for disability, it may still take a few weeks before you begin to receive your montly disability benefits. This is because Social Security has a number of things to do before you are put into pay status.

Now, here’s the longer answer.

If you file for NC disability benefits and your claim is approved, the approval will have been made by a disability examiner at DDS (disability determination services in North Carolina).

Note: administrative law judges are involved in the process; however, this is not until the second appeal level, which is the ALJ hearing level.

When a disability examiner at NC DDS makes an approval on a claim, the case is transferred back to the Social Security office where the claim started. The claim, in fact, will go back to the desk of the same CR, or claims representative, who interviewed you when you filed for disability.

This individual will process the claim so that it may enter “pay status”.

Getting a person into pay status is relatively quick and easy. Someone who has been awarded Social Security Disability benefits (SSD) can usually expect to receive their Social Security backpay within 30 days, and their regular monthly disability benefits the month after that. This is typically how long will it take to receive NC disability benefits under the title 2 Social Security Disability insurance program (SSDI).

For a person who is received an SSI disability award, the wait may be just a little bit longer. This is because, for SSI (supplemental security income), Social Security must conduct one final interview before they process a person’s SSI benefits.

This interview is called an “end of line “interview. This is where the Social Security claims representative, or CR, will, one last time, ask questions about whatever assets the claimant may have.

Assets, in this case, refers to whatever money they may have in a bank account, as well as whatever real property, or automobiles, or cash value in life insurance, they may have.

Once this final interview regarding assets has been completed, an SSI person’s backpay and monthly benefits can be processed as fast as for a person who is receiving Social Security Disability.

And this is exactly why a person who has been awarded SSI disability should make the effort to get to the Social Security office as quickly as possible to have this interview completed, so that they can receive their SSI backpay and their regular monthly benefits.