Disability Benefits Step 4: Prove You Can’t Do Your Last Relevant Work

How Does Social Security Disability Judge Your Past Relevant Work?

To decide if you could go back to a job you did before—instead of getting Social Security Disability Insurance benefits—claims examiners will look at 15 years of your work history.

It’s generally 15 years back from the point when say you could no longer work due to bad health.

This is what Social Security does with the details of your past relevant work:

• Reviews on-the-job requirements of your past work
• Compares those demands to the limits of your current impairments
• Compares the way your job was set up to how the same job usually looks in the general workforce
• If the job is often different from how you did it, checks if your impairments rule out working that way, too

If you were an administrative assistant in an office and your job required lifting and carrying 50-pound boxes, a physical disorder you now face could mean you can’t do that anymore.

But if most administrative assistants don’t lift 50-pound boxes, maybe you could still do the job somewhere else. You’ll might get denied for disability benefits.

As you can see, Social Security is strict about awarding SSDI benefits. Your Social Security Disability lawyer is there to make this process easier.

Want to learn more about how your situation applies under the Social Security Disability rules? The Troutman disability lawyers don’t charge anything for an initial conversation about your options.