Applying for Disability Payments
[Melinda],
Well, you cannot apply for disability until after you leave your job. But the process once you do leave goes something like this:
- On the day you resign, call your local Social Security office. Check your local phone book for the correct number.
- Tell them that you’re applying for disability, and then they’ll guide you through the rest of the process.Â
- They’ll probably require you to be evaluated by one of their physicians.Â
- Then, assuming that they grant it to you, you’ll get your first monthly check on the third day of the month that follows the six-month anniversary of the date that you applied. If you applied on March 17th for example, you’d get your first check on October 3rd. So make sure you have enough ready cash to live until then.
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Your management probably won’t suggest that you go on leave unless you’re literally dying. Such leave costs them more than having you there working, even if your time there only amounts to part-time status.Â
If you have no intentions of suing them, then tell them that and have them add that clause in the paperwork you’d have to sign to go on leave.
Sure, suggesting a replacement for yourself wouldn’t hurt, since it would make you more dispensable to the company, and thus, they’d be more willing to let you go. If you can convince them that this woman writes with your high caliber of performance and that they need not spend too much training money to bring her up to speed, they’d be crazy not to seriously consider your request.
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Tom