Legal Question in Social Security Law in Washington

Re: Inaccuracy of retroactive back payments for SSI

Hi- In response to your question regarding whether or not SSI can offset your RIB payments, unfortunately the resonse is that they can. SSI is basically a welfare program, i.e., they take into consideration any and all monies you receive from any source, including your SS retirement disability, in calculating how much SSI you will receive.

Do you have enough quarters to be eligible for Social Security disability? If so, then you should receive that rather than your retirement, since you will receive less in retirement because SSA reduces your retirement amount for the months you retire early. However, if you receive Social Security disability, that too would be deducted from any SSI you would be entitled to. Good luck. Candace Davenport

Re: Inaccuracy of retroactive back payments for SSI

This is a common issue. Even though you were entitled to collect BOTH SSD and SSI, you cannot add up each independent benefit for a total of both, they offset eachother to some extent. June 2003 through January 2004, if you were in fact disabled [not capable of being either meaningfully or gainfully employed due to disabling condition(s)]you would be entitled to SSD if you were otherwise earnings qualified. SSI entitlement is based upon the same disability criteria, but it is a form of federal welfare of sorts since you have substantially no assets that are not exempt from disqualification.

Without seeing the actual Decision and or other SSA?SSI documents, it is a little difficult to determine what benefits on a dollar basis have or have not been offset.

Clearly, June 03 to Jan 04, if qualified, you ar eentitled to SSD and SSI funds. Starting January 2004, the retirement date, this starts retirement only from that point. Since the age based retirement is not retroactive to a point prior to age 62, there should be no offset for retirement dollars.

I hope I have made this clear for you.

Make an appointment with your local SSA office and caseworker. have them go over your papers for you. If yo are not satisfied with their answers, then an attorney familiar with Soc Sec should be consulted. Usually, attorney's charge a 25% of withheld benefits in this area of law. However, you may have a hard time hiring someone since the amounts in question are rather small--some 6 months at give or take $1,000 to $1,200 per month.

I'll be happy to consult with you at a later time if you do the homework.

Sincerely,

Mark Geyer