How long does it take to get approved for disability in texas

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) payments begin after you serve a five-month waiting period, which generally starts with the date you became disabled. Your first benefit payment will be for the sixth full month after that date.

For example, if Social Security decides that your disability began Jan. 15, your initial payment will be for July and you'll get it in August, as Social Security pays benefits in the month after the month for which they're due.

The important thing to remember is that the date your disability began, what Social Security calls the onset date, is not the same as the date your claim for SSDI was approved, or when you applied. Your onset date — essentially, the day you became unable to work due to your medical condition — could be days, weeks or even months before you filed for benefits.

In practice, this means that if your application is approved, you might not have to wait that long for your benefits. In November 2021, Social Security's average processing time for an SSDI application was 168 days, or roughly five and a half months. Even if you filed your claim on the day you became disabled, the waiting period could be over by the time the claim is approved.

Let's say you applied for SSDI in August 2021 due to chronic, worsening back pain. In January 2022, Social Security grants your claim, determining from its review of medical and other evidence that July 15 is when your condition became severe enough to stop you from working. Your first payment would be for January, and you'd get it in February.

What if Social Security concludes that you became disabled even earlier — say, in April 2021? You would have theoretically been entitled to benefits in October 2021, but you could not have gotten them because your application wasn't approved yet. In this case, Social Security can pay retroactive benefits for the three months between the end of your waiting period and when it approved your claim.

In fact, Social Security can pay retroactive SSDI for up to 12 months prior to the date you filed your application, if it determines that you were qualified to receive benefits well before you applied.

Why a waiting period?

The five-month pause has been part of SSDI since the program began in the mid-1950s. The idea is to make sure applicants genuinely have a lasting disability, not a short-term illness or injury from which they might recover quickly, and to deter those who can work from applying. Congressional research has found that eliminating it would cost Social Security billions of dollars per year.

There are some exceptions to the waiting period. For example, a federal law passed in 2020 eliminated the wait if you are disabled due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). If Social Security determines that your disability from ALS began in November, you would be entitled to a benefit for December.

You may also be able to skip the waiting period if you need to go back on disability after being off benefits for up to five years. If the reason your SSDI stopped is that you returned to work and exceeded Social Security's earnings limit for disabled beneficiaries, you can ask for your benefits to be resumed right away through a process called expedited reinstatement. You can receive provisional benefits for up to six months while Social Security decides if you are entitled to SSDI again.

Updated December 28, 2021

There are hundreds of illnesses and disorders, as well as certain medical and personal circumstances, that may qualify you for expedited processing of a claim for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). There are also procedures for fast-tracking applications for Supplemental Security Income (SSI), a benefit program for low-income people who are disabled, blind, or 65 and older that is administered (but not funded) by the Social Security Administration (SSA).

Social Security’s Compassionate Allowances (CAL) program maintains a list of conditions — numbering 266 as of August 2022 — that can shorten the processing time for SSDI claims from months to a matter of days. (This still may not result in immediate payments upon approval.) The roster includes fast-moving cancers, immune-system and neurodegenerative diseases, rare genetic disorders and other illnesses that by definition meet Social Security’s standard for disability: They prevent sufferers from working or are likely to result in death. 

You do not have to apply specially for a compassionate allowance (or for any form of expedited review). Social Security uses a software system to identify applications that cite impairments on the CAL list. Whether you qualify for a quick decision depends on your diagnosis and its severity­. More than 800,000 people have received accelerated approval through the program, according to the SSA. 

Social Security uses another electronic system, Quick Disability Determination (QDD), to screen applications for disability benefits or SSI that are filed online. QDD scans for key words and phrases that indicate a claim is highly likely to be approved, and it checks that the application includes all required documentation. These cases are marked for quicker processing. Applications that are not filed electronically are reviewed by claims examiners, who can also flag them for fast-track status.

Social Security has several other programs and procedures to speed up particular disability claims:

• Applications that indicate the claimant’s condition has reached a terminal stage can be moved to the front of the line. Certain situations — for example, a metastasized cancer, or a patient in hospice care — trigger automatic fast-tracking. 
• Circumstances that don’t involve specific diseases or terminal conditions can also merit expedited processing: a low-birth-weight infant, for instance, or a disability claimant in imminent danger of becoming homeless. 
• If you are an SSI applicant with one of about 15 severe physical or intellectual impairments — among them amputation, Down syndrome, total blindness or deafness, and HIV/AIDS — Social Security may find you have a “presumptive disability.” This qualifies you for up to six months of benefits while your claim wends its way through the lengthy review process.
• Social Security can expedite SSDI and SSI claims for veterans who became disabled while on active duty. The disability need not have occurred in the course of military action — for example, it could be the result of an injury while on leave — but it must have occurred since Oct. 1, 2001. Be sure to notify Social Security at the start of the application process that the condition stems from your period of service.

Keep in mind

• All SSDI claims are subject to a waiting period for benefits. The earliest payments can start is five months from the date that Social Security determines your disability began, based on the medical evidence you provide. This is the case even if your application is fast-tracked and approved during those months. There is no such waiting period for SSI payments.
• If you have a condition that is not already approved for expedited status under the CAL program, you can ask Social Security to consider it for inclusion.

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