Whether you should hire a Social Security lawyer depends on the status of your claim, the facts of your disability, and your skills at researching the law and representing yourself. What do others do? When we surveyed readers across the U.S. to ask about their disability claims, we learned that only 30% had hired a lawyer to help them submit the initial application, but 71% of those who attended an appeal hearing hired a lawyer for the hearing.
What Are the Cons of Hiring a Lawyer?
The only real con of hiring a lawyer is that, if you win your claim, the lawyer will receive part of your back payments from Social Security. The lawyer can take up to 25% of your back pay, up to a maximum cap of $7,200 (but the fee has to be based on the amount of time the lawyer spends on your case). When we surveyed readers, we found that the average fee collected by Social Security lawyers was $3,750, much lower than the maximum (and even lower in SSI cases: $2,900).
In many cases, this is money well spent because the disability claimant wouldn't have been approved without a lawyer—or, the claimant would have gotten less money without the lawyer. While the severity of your disability doesn't affect the amount of money you get, the date that Social Security thinks you became disabled does matter. A judge may try to pay you less backpay by moving up your "date of disability onset" to a more recent date. A lawyer can help you get benefits going back to the date you originally claimed as your onset date, which means more backpay for you.
On the other hand, if you have a strong disability case, the money might be wasted if you can win benefits applying by yourself. To assess the strength of your case, you could do some research on when Social Security treats CHF and COPD as disabilities (more on this below) or try to arrange a free consultation with a lawyer.
What Are the Pros of Hiring a Lawyer?
Your attorney will develop a "theory" of why you are disabled under Social Security disability law: either that your condition meets one of Social Security's disability “listings,” that your exertion level (such as sedentary) prevents you from doing any jobs, or that you have non-exertional limitations (such as difficulty with memory and concentration) that prevent you from working.
In your case, your lawyer would assess whether you could meet the COPD listing or the CHF listing. If your medical records show that you have poor breathing test results or poor ejection fraction measurements (gauging the blood flow through the heart), your lawyer should be able to tell you if you have a good chance of meeting the requirements of one or both listings.
If your medical records are insufficient, your lawyer could also help you arrange for a breathing test or ejection fraction test before you apply, so that you have a better chance of winning disability at the initial application stage. If necessary, a disability attorney can request that Social Security schedule (and pay for) an exam with a doctor or psychologist.
Help With the Initial Application
If you hire an attorney at the outset, the lawyer (or more likely, a paralegal or assistant) would help you fill out your disability application and supporting documents in a way that makes it clear to a claims examiner that your conditions meet the listings or that you can't work due to your limitations. Disability attorneys know what a claims examiner looks for to see when a particular medical condition should be treated as a disability.
Generally, because disability attorneys get paid on contingency (only if you win), they are motivated to track down important medical records and test results and talk to your doctors, or at least obtain detailed statements from them. (Often, doctors are more likely to respond to an attorney’s request for a supportive statement than to a patient’s request.)
What to do? Generally, if you have test results for a severe physical disability that seem to meet a listing, you might not need to hire a lawyer for the initial application, assuming you can fill it out competently on your own. On the other hand, it's very hard to meet a listing for a mental claim, both at the initial application stage and the hearing stage, so it makes sense to at least consult with a lawyer on mental or cognitive conditions.
One thing to keep in mind: if a lawyer only helps you with your initial application (and you get approved without having to go to a hearing), the fee you have to pay a lawyer will be fairly low. That's because fees are based on backpay, and the amount of backpay you'll receive will be low (claimants usually only get large backpay awards when they have to wait a year or two for a hearing). In the survey of readers we did, the average attorneys' fee for those who were approved after the initial application was $3,100.
Help at the Hearing Stage
If you're denied at the application level, it becomes more important to hire a lawyer. Disability lawyers know how to prepare a disability case for a hearing and they have the necessary expertise with Social Security rules and regulations to win at the hearing. Your lawyer may want to practice asking you questions that the judge might ask so that you aren't nervous at the hearing and so that you can testify (honestly) in a way that's helpful to your case.
Also, at the hearing, your attorney will have a turn to cross-examine the vocational expert (VE), who will testify at your hearing about your ability to work. Your attorney will know how to ask the VE about the physical or mental requirements of jobs that the VE tells the ALJ you can do (if any), and whether those jobs are available in significant numbers—to hopefully show that there aren't actually jobs available for you to do. Without an attorney, it's difficult for a claimant to do this successfully. In addition, your lawyer will likely be familiar with how the particular judge likes to run hearings, and will be able to present evidence according to what the judge likes—and does not like—to hear.
Is hiring a lawyer for your hearing worth the money? In the survey of readers we did, the average attorneys' fee for those who hired a lawyer for the hearing was $4,600 (though more than half paid the maximum fee of $6,000). But the hearing is the last good chance you have of getting approved for benefits, so you may decide it's worth part of your backpay to hire the lawyer (and you don't have to pay if you don't win).
Will Your Outcome Be Different If You Hire a Disability Lawyer?
What do the statistics say on outcomes? In our survey of readers, 60% of readers with lawyers were approved for disability benefits, compared to 33% of those who didn’t use an attorney. Unless your case is very clear cut and the evidence points strongly to your disability, you might be better off hiring an attorney. And if you don't want to wait upwards of two years for a hearing date, you might try to hire an attorney for help with the initial application. Read more about our disability survey results for more information on how to improve your chances.