Social Security is not necessarily interested in punishing disabled workers who try to go back to work and earn a living rather than collecting disability payments, so the agency came up with a trial work period. A trial work period allows a disabled worker to earn a certain amount of work-related income and disability benefits at the same time to encourage people to try and go back to work.
What Is The Purpose Of The Trial Work Period?
A trial work period provides an incentive for personal rehabilitation efforts for you as a disabled worker, disabled widow(er), or childhood disability beneficiary (who is still disabled) to return to work. It allows you to test your ability to work for up to nine months within a 60-consecutive-month period without your earnings for those months affecting your benefits.
If your disability does not improve and you continue to report your work activity, your rights to trial work period benefits are not affected. Any work and earnings during the nine-month trial work period is disregarded in determining whether your disability ended during the trial work period.
The trial work period does not prevent the consideration of any medical evidence that demonstrates your recovery before the ninth-month period. If your condition has improved, it is possible for your benefits to end before you complete your ninth month of trial work. Only one trial work period is allowed in any one period of disability.
When Is Your Work During The Trial Work Period Not Counted As A Month Of Service?
For calendar year 2018, use the following guidelines to determine if your work during a trial work period does not count as a “month of service” for trial work period purposes:
- Your earnings from employment are $850 or less in a month; or
- Your earnings from self-employment activity are $850 or less in a month and you spend 80 hours or less in self-employment activity. The dollar amount is adjusted each year based on the national average wage.
When Are Benefits In The Trial Work Period Not Payable?
If you are convicted by a Federal Court of fraudulently concealing work activity that occurred during the TWP, you are not eligible to receive payment for any TWP months that occur in or after March 2004 and before the date of the conviction. If payments for those TWP months have already been paid to you, you will be liable for repayment.
