When you use for Social Security Disability Insurance, it volition have betwixt iii-v months for your SSDI application to be reviewed—and sometimes more. Thankfully, the Social Security Administration volition issue SSDI back pay. You lot are entitled to benefit payments that yous would have received between the time of your awarding and the showtime of your monthly benefit payments.

How Is SSDI Back Pay Calculated?

  • Established Onset Engagement is Determined
  • Monthly Benefit Amount is Calculated
  • Retroactive Back Pay Amounts are Calculated
  • Full Amount of SSDI Back Pay is Calculated

Proceed in mind that SSDI Benefit Payments exercise not begin until 5 months subsequently your Established Onset Appointment, which is usually the appointment of your application. This is a standard waiting period in the SSDI application process, and its purpose is to make sure that each SSDI recipient is someone with a long term disability that needs assist.

The formula for SSDI back payments becomes i where those 5 months are subtracted from the dorsum pay amount—because you would have needed to wait 5 months for those payments to begin anyway.

For example, let's say that your SSDI benefits are canonical 5 months after your SSDI awarding. In this case, you lot would not get any SSDI back payments. Fifty-fifty though your benefits are backdated to the date of your application, it takes 5 months for the payments to brainstorm—and so that five-month waiting period wipes out your dorsum pay.

But in some other case, let's say that your SSDI benefits have ten months to get approved. In this case, you lot would receive v months of SSDI dorsum pay. The standard 5-month waiting menses for SSDI payments begins at the Established Onset Engagement, or the engagement of your SSDI application. Simply then, for any reason, you had to wait an additional 5 months for your application to go approved by the SSA. Therefore, the SSA will outcome back payments to cover those v months.

12-Month Limit

Withal, in that location is a 12-month cap on SSDI dorsum pay. Then, for example, if your SSDI application took two years to get approved (which can happen), then y'all might recall that you should be awarded 19 months of SSDI back pay (that is, 24 months to the Established Onset Engagement, minus the v month waiting period). However, that 12-month cap means y'all volition merely become 12 months of SSDI back pay.

How Much Back Pay Volition I Go from SSDI?

The corporeality of back pay varies from person to person. Of course, before any amount of back benefits are determined, your disability claim will demand to be assessed by a inability examiner. They will take a look at the Social Security inability awarding you have put together, which includes identifying information for each bidder, and various forms about your medical condition and your work history.

In one case your disability application is assessed and canonical, your monthly disability payments will be calculated. Once that monthly disability payment is established, any due benefits owed as a back payment to a claimant will be issued as a lump sum payment. Let's take a await at the process step by step.

Established Onset Appointment Is Adamant

When y'all fill out your SSDI application, you will indicate a date when you believe your disability began, which is referred to as the Declared Onset Date. The SSA will determine when your disability began, which ordinarily coincides with the date of your awarding. This date is referred to as the Established Onset Date (EOD) or sometimes as the disability onset engagement. If you feel you tin can make a serious instance for an earlier appointment, yous tin file an appeal.

The Established Onset Appointment will become the starting point for calculating that v-month waiting period, and any amount of back pay, should your application take longer than 5 months to become approved.

Monthly Do good Amount Is Calculated

SSDI benefits are calculated using a formula based on your highest monthly wages or income in a 35-year period. This amount is referred to every bit your Average Indexed Monthly Earnings, or AIME. You will be issued xc% of your AIME under $960, 32% of everything over that but under $v,785, and 15% of anything beyond that as your Master Insurance Corporeality or PIA—the amount yous volition receive each calendar month. This of course, then becomes the footing for determining how much SSDI dorsum pay you will receive.

Retroactive Back Pay Amounts Are Calculated

If the SSA honors your Alleged Onset Appointment, that means there has been some time before y'all applied for SSDI, when your disability prevented you from working. In these cases, the SSA volition too issue retroactive back pay, which is unlike from SSDI back pay. SSDI back pay is the corporeality you should receive to comprehend any lapse in payment between your application and when you commencement getting payments, minus those 5 months.

Retroactive back pay is payment the SSA volition honour you to cover your period of disability before you even applied for SSDI. And again, there is a 12-month limit. This is a good reason to never filibuster filling out the SSDI application.

Full Corporeality of SSDI Back Pay Is Calculated

Once the SSA has established your monthly SSDI benefits payment, and one time they have determined your Established Onset Date, they will exist able to make up one's mind how much back pay an SSDI recipient receives. Information technology'due south important to proceed in mind how this timeframe is calculated.

The Department of Social Security merely counts total calendar months, and so if you become disabled in the middle of a month, that month volition not count towards your back pay. Notwithstanding, if yous became disabled (again, that typically means—according to the SSA—the solar day you filed your application), that month volition count. If there was a change in your income during the period covered by back pay, that will exist reflected in your back pay, though this situation is non common.

While there is not necessarily a maximum amount of back pay you can receive, remember that information technology is calculated based on your previous income and express to 12 months maximum. That said, the maximum amount that is possible to collect will vary from person to person.

How Long Does It Take to Get SSDI Dorsum Pay?

At that place is a 5-month waiting period dated from the date of your application, or your Established Onset Date (EOD), which, according to the SSA, is the date on which y'all became disabled. The SSA has created this delayed payment construction to filter out any claims that are non truly long term cases of inability. As it turns out, most applications take three-5 months to get approved, so the beginning of your SSDI benefit payments might coincide with your SSDI Honor Letter.

Nonetheless, some SSDI applications will take longer than five months to approve. If your SSDI application does accept longer than five months, the five-month waiting menses will be subtracted from however many months it took to process—you will not accept to wait an additional 5 months. By the same token, if your awarding is approved in 3 months, y'all volition need to wait two months to get any pay at all—and you lot would not qualify for SSDI back pay.

When Does SSDI Back Pay Outset?

SSDI dorsum pay will cover any time menstruum between your EOD (application appointment) and your approving, minus the five-calendar month waiting menses. Technically, back pay begins on your application engagement. If the SSA agrees with your merits that an alleged onset date indicates your disability began earlier, they will event retroactive benefits. But keep in mind that this retroactive payment is limited to a 12-month maximum.

When Will I Receive My SSDI Back Pay?

It usually takes around 60 days to receive your back pay. Different SSI, SSDI back pay is ofttimes provided as one lump sum payment. Nevertheless, it can just be paid by directly eolith, so you will need an active bank account in order to receive these funds. The SSA is very careful almost calculating the Social Security benefit amounts for SSDI applicants, and then you should not expect an overpayment.

Is SSDI Back Pay Taxable?

SSDI dorsum pay should non be viewed as a dissever amount of money from your SSDI payments, even if it comes as one lump sum. Information technology is coin that should have been paid to yous from the time of the onset of your disability. There are no special tax considerations, other than how it contributes to your total amount of income and general rules about income tax. Taxes vary from state to state but are consistent at the federal level.

If your income is under $25,000 equally a single filer or $34,000 for a married couple filing jointly, your SSDI income is non taxable. If you do brand more than that, only 50% is taxable. Some states might take a tax on your lump-sum back payments, merely most practise not.

By contrast, SSI benefits are non taxable. For one, the corporeality falls below a taxable threshold. Secondly, SSI benefits are themselves culled from previous taxpayer contributions, then it does not make sense to tax an SSI recipient twice. However, if you are an SSDI and SSI recipient, your income tax situation may be different, and it may behoove you lot to strategize your financial programme with a disability chaser.

Social Security Back Pay

When applying for SSDI, there is a standard 5-month await that does not count towards dorsum pay. That's why information technology is always important to file for Social Security Disability as shortly as you become disabled. Exercise not effort to look out your affliction or see how information technology develops. When yous employ, make sure you provide all the necessary paperwork, meet the deadlines, and prove up to your interview, in order to speed up the process.

In some cases, y'all will benefit from soliciting the services of a Social Security inability lawyer to help you file a case. If your SSDI application does take longer than 5 months to process, yous will be awarded back pay and/or retroactive pay for upwards to 12 months. Back pay covers any time between your application, otherwise known as the EOD.

Retroactive pay covers whatsoever time period between the onset of your affliction and when y'all filed your application, if the SSA agrees with your claim in such matters. It may be tempting to quickly spend lump sum payment, just it's prudent to allocate your funds wisely to needed expenses or strategize with a financial planner about how to maximize their usefulness and impact.