PAST RELEVANT WORK AND WHY IT MATTERS

During your disability hearing, the administrative law judge will ask the vocational expert to classify your past relevant work (PRW) - which means all the jobs you have done during the last 15 years.  Why is this important?

Because the judge will ask the vocational expert if you are able to perform any of those jobs, based on your age, education and residual functional capacity.  If the answer is yes, you have probably lost your hearing.

Where does information about your past work come from?  If you remember back to the time when you filed your original application for disability benefits there was a form called "Work History Report."  That form asked you a lot of questions about each of your past jobs:  job title, salary, what you did all day on the job; how much you had to sit, stand, and walk; what was the heaviest weight you lifted, etc.  This form follows you all the way to the hearing, 2 or 3 years later and this is where the vocational witness gets most of the information about your past jobs.  Unfortunately, most claimants either skip this form completely or provide only skimpy information, thinking that it's just another annoying form that isn't important.

The easier (less demanding) your past jobs seem, the more likely the judge will find that you can still perform one or more of them. This leads to what we call a Step 4 denial:  The claimant is able to perform past relevant work.




The Work History Report is very important and should be completed carefully.  If it was not, your representative should be careful to question you at the hearing to get on the record the details of each job you performed during the past 15 years (the relevant period).  In doing this, your attorney is trying to avoid a Step 4 denial.  If you are age 50 or over, a finding that you are no longer able to perform past work may be enough to win your case.

There are so many things going on in a Social Security disability case that the claimant is not aware of.  It's like an iceberg.  You an see a little of it above the water line; however, most of it is below the surface and is invisible.  That's why you must trust your representative to know what to do, both at the hearing and in preparing for the hearing.


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Charles W. Forsythe
7027 Old Madison Pike - Suite 108
Huntsville, AL 35806
CALL US:  (256) 799-0297