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Originally Posted by Rose76
CBOXPALACE - I expect that I would want the attorney to do the paperwork and the filing.
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Don't need a lawyer for this..
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To an attorney time is money. The attorney, I suspect (and I may be wrong) is not going to invest an amount of time that far exceeds the value of his expected 25% fee.
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True, and if they don't think you have a case they can win, their not gonna take it. Also, here's what happens... They decide to take your case, they gather info from doctor/therapist.. They file the claim with ssa based on that information THEY obtained from your doctor/therapist. It's sent to ssa... For the moment the lawyer is done... Once DDS has it, your lawyer is out of the equation for the time being. DDS will decide if your disabled and send you a letter stating if your approved or denied. If your denied your lawyer goes back to work filing your appeal. It's in their best interest to get you approves as soon as possible. The more involved it becomes.. the more it's costing them... not you.
I should add once DDS has it and everything is in order.. their gonna have you go see their doctors, and get their input. In my case I had to go to both a psychiatrist and psychologist. I saw the psychiatrist for probably an hour, and the psychologist for a few hours.
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That's why I think that if the claimant can help with gathering medical history and other relevant info, it makes the case more worthwhile to the attorney.
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Wrong, and here's why.. This is what you're paying your lawyer to do, and their going to do it regardless.. It's their job, not yours. When I first applied.. The law firm I used did an initial telephone interview with me asking me a series of questions related to my mental illness. They chose to take my case. They obtained medical records, and also sent sent questionaires to my doctor, my therapist, and to me. These were extensive questionaires (about 10 pages long) asking RELEVENT questions they would need answers to for filing my claim. They provided my doctors/therapist the criteria used by social security in determining if someone is disabled. Your doctor can say your disabled all he wants to.... The real question is do you meet the criteria set forth by social security.
So.. you can go and spend lots of time gathering paperwork etc, and the lawyer is still going to get the information they want from the doctor/therapist.
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Remember that a good deal of the work a law firm does is actually performed by para-legals.
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Correct! You'll probably never meet your lawyer unless it goes before a judge.
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My concern is that I might provide more detailed responses than the para-legal would. You are very right in saying that the pros know what SSA is looking for. So, certainly, I would say I need them to make sure that the information presented is relevant to the claim. To sum up, I think it should be a collaborate effort. I would not try to do this on my own.
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The information you provide them will determine if they want to accept your case or not. Before they submit anything... Their going to be in contact with ALL your doctors/therapists. The information THEY obtain from your doctors/therapist is what their going to use. The information you provide... all that's relevent for is helping them decide if they want to take your case. You don't need paperwork from that. They'll get it from your doctors... NO, it's not a collaborative effort... What you think is relevent or a detailed response, may actually be irrelevent and not needed. They know what needs to be done, what information is relevent, and how the system works... Remember.. Time is money.. for them.. the more involved it becomes the more it's going to be eating into their paycheck...