Social Security law requires that your disability payments be offset or reduced to take into account any Workers’ Compensation settlement.
This makes it very important for your Workers’ Compensation lawyer to be aware of your filing for Social Security Disability benefits.
The best situation is to use the same lawyer for both the work injury claim and the Social Security Disability claim, however if that is not possible then make sure that your Workers’ Comp lawyer talks with your Social Security attorney.
Your work comp lawyer must make sure to put special spread language approved through SSA to reduce any offset as much as allowed pursuant to SSA rules.
I have seen several Work Comp settlements that have not used this special language and the disabled workers suffers greatly as a result.
These injured workers have had their Social Security disability benefits cut off for several years.
The result is that it would have better for the injured worker to never have taken any money for the Work Comp settlement.
Make sure that you do not sign any work comp settlement contracts without having them reviewed carefully by and experienced Social Security Disability attorney.
Do you have a work comp injury and are you disabled? Feel free to contact me, Dirk May, an experienced Social Security Disability and Illinois Workers’ Compensation Attorney at 309-827-4371.