Filing an Application

Filing a Request for Reconsideration

Proceeding to a Hearing before an Administrative Law Judge

The Appeals Council

Federal Court

Determining Disability Benefits


Step Three: Proceeding to a Hearing before an Administrative Law Judge

Persons whose claims are denied in whole, or in part at the reconsideration level can request a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge within sixty (60) days of the date noted on the reconsideration denial. The Office of Hearings and Appeals assumes that a persons receives the notice denying their claim at the reconsideration level within five (5) days after the date of the notice, unless there is evidence to the contrary. As a result, the claimant actually has 65 days to appeal.

The request for hearing must be in writing and filed with the local Social Security Administration office. Hearing requests are then forwarded to the Office of Hearings and Appeals. After the request for a hearing is received at the Office of Hearings, the staff will await the arrival of the file from the local office before any further development is started. OHA will contact those persons who are represented by attorneys by writing to their counsel. Experienced attorneys will typically start doing further development, i.e. compiling more medical and vocational evidence at this point, so as to assist the administrative law judge in their early evaluation of the case. This enhances the chance that the claimant will receive a favorable decision without having to appear at a hearing.

When a hearing is held, the administrative law judge, usually through a hearing assistant, decides whether the evidence in the file is adequate to resolve the issues or whether factual development of some type is necessary. The judge or assistant then decides what additional evidence is necessary, if any, and whether a vocational expert and/or or medical expert(s) should be called to appear at the hearing. The judge or assistant also notes any questions of law or policy which will require research prior to the hearing, and considers what action is needed regarding any confidential information in the file. Attorneys representing a claimant will often be contacted, advised of what the ALJ believes is necessary in the way of new evidence and/or pre-hearing legal analysis of one issue or another.

Once a case is ready for hearing, a scheduling clerk schedules the hearing together with a certain number of other claims to be heard by a particular administrative law judge in a particular area. Hearings are generally scheduled in the order of the dates of the requests for hearings. However, geography and other factors must also be considered. It is customary for attorneys representing claimants to be contacted before hearings are scheduled, so as to ascertain their availability and their clients for a particular date. The minimum time period for notifying claimants of a hearing date is 20 days.

A claimant may request postponement of a scheduled hearing but postponements are granted only for good cause, i.e. a viable explanation. If a claimant fails to appear, a show cause order may be issued - this requires the claimant to explain why they did not attend. If no acceptable explanation is provided, the request for a hearing can be dismissed. A show cause gives a claimant 10 days to submit in writing the reason why the claimant did not appear at the hearing. If no good cause is found, the request for hearing may be dismissed on the basis of abandonment. The time or place of the hearing must be changed if the claimant or his or her representative cannot attend the hearing due to a "serious physical or mental condition, incapacitating injury, or death in the family," or if "severe weather conditions make it impossible to travel to the hearing". Persons who are not represented by attorneys, and who subsequently retain legal representation are generally granted postponements, if such representation was only acquired shortly before the scheduled hearing.

The hearing itself is informal and not typical of conventional civil and criminal trials. A formal written decision is issued that must include a recitation of evidence considered and detailed reasons for the decision, regardless of whether the decision is favorable or unfavorable.