Every once in a while Social Security will conduct a Continuing Disability Review (CDR) to determine if a Social Security disability beneficiary remains disabled and is still entitled to benefits, but due the Coronavirus outbreak Social Security is suspending the CDR process. All CDRs will be put on hold during these uncertain times and beneficiaries will continue to receive monthly benefits.
Additionally, Social Security will also suspend the practice of attempting to collect overpayments that some beneficiaries received. Social Security will occasionally issue payments to beneficiaries who don’t qualify for them due to improved impairments or work income, when this happens Social Security wants its money back, but any work on collecting overpayments will now be on hold until further notice. Below are some other practices, per work from Social Security, it has suspended during the Coronavirus spread.
What workloads is SSA not doing during the COVID-19 pandemic?
We have suspended the following workloads until further notice:
- We will not start or complete any current medical continuing disability reviews. If you have a medical continuing disability review pending, please do not request medical information from your doctors at this time. We will follow up with you for any medical evidence once the COVID-19 public health emergency subsides.
- Where possible, we are suspending our processing and collection of overpayments.
- We are not conducting organization or individual representative payee accountings.
- We will not be able to process a third party requests for information, except from appointed representatives and representative payees
- We will not process any Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
Social Security may end up suspending more services due to the pandemic, if that happens we will report that. During these limits on Social Security’s workloads the processing and issuing of decisions is expected to be extremely slow, so practicing patience with the process is more important than ever.
