Federal Worker Disability Retirement: Effective Repetition

Repetition is an effective tool in any writing forum, if the audience to whom such repetitive tools are directed, is taken into account.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the repetitive restatement of specific medical conditions, the symptoms exhibited and manifested over the years, the impact upon certain elements of both one’s positional duties and daily living activities from the medical conditions themselves, etc. — all can be effectively stated throughout the Federal Disability Retirement application itself.

For, repetition can also produce the appearance of consistency; and when the same or similar phrase or concept is repeated in different documents — in the applicant’s statement of disability; in the doctor’s narrative reports; in the Supervisor’s Statement; in the medical office notes and progress notes; such repetition reveals a consistency of terms, which reflects a reality of chronicity as to the state, severity, and nature of the medical condition and its impact upon one’s ability or inability to perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s job, which is what must be proven in a Federal Disability Retirement application.

That is why the order and sequence of what to write, when to write it, and what to wait for before writing one’s Applicant’s Statement of Disability (SF 3112A) is important.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Medical Retirement Benefits for US Government Employees: Discretionary Proprieties

One can know a friend for decades, but catch him or her at the wrong time, and be the recipient of a reaction which astounds and confounds.  In everyday life, most of what we do is based upon a routine of habit.  We may rearrange the deck of chairs by doing X chore before tackling issue Y, but for the most part, our lives are set within the confines of a comfortable routine.  And that is probably a good thing; for, as order and continuity allows for a peace of mind, so a set routine provides a sense of comfort and security.

How we deal with disorderliness and chaos, however, often determines whether the comfort of a routine was ultimately healthy for us.  Confronting a sudden emergency; having a medical condition which interrupts our formulated goals; asking for support from others when a need arises — those are the life “tests” which separate our friends from all others.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the sudden need to garner extraordinary support (and the term “extra-ordinary” is applicable precisely because it requires actions out of the ordinary course of people’s lives) from others — family members, agency personnel, doctors, etc. — will test one’s patience and confidence in one’s fellow man.

In trying to get the support of others, one must use one’s sense of discretion and propriety — of the right time and place — by sensing how to approach each.

The old metaphor of a “bull in a china shop” will often apply.  For the Federal or Postal Worker, the “bull” is the Federal or Postal worker who needs the support; the china shop is represented by all others.  The trick is to walk softly and carefully, and with great tact.  In doing so, remember that you are disrupting the comfortable routine of others.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Federal and Postal Disability Retirement: SSDI & OPM Disability Retirement

Until the economy begins to significantly expand in order to allow for a greater increase of the workforce, those who are on FERS or CSRS Disability Retirement often consider aggressively pursuing Social Security Disability benefits.

While the standard of proof is higher, where the concept of “total disability” is much more applicable (pragmatic interpretation:  the medical condition presents a quantifying impact upon a greater area of one’s life activities, and not merely upon the essential elements of one’s job), the problem with SSDI benefits is that it limits the Federal and Postal employee from making outside income beyond about a thousand dollars per month.

Without SSDI, of course, a former Federal or Postal worker who is receiving Disability Retirement benefits through the Office of Personnel Management, can earn up to 80% of what one’s former (Postal or non-Postal Federal) job currently pays.  And, with the ability to retain one’s health insurance benefits, life insurance, etc., the Federal Disability Retirement annuitant can be an attractive labor force for companies who are trying to contain costs and expenses.

This is a highly competitive economy, with companies being proactively selective and discriminating in their hiring practices.  For the Federal or Postal employee preparing, formulating, and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether under FERS or CSRS, many options remain open, and advantages to be taken. Yes, the medical condition itself is a “negative” which forces one to leave the Federal workforce; but once FERS or CSRS disability retirement benefits are approved, there are many positive decisions to make.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Early Medical Retirement for Disabled Federal Workers: Fish or Cut Bait

Colloquial expressions often develop over time because of their shorthanded effectiveness; they are the antiquated equivalent of text-messaging abbreviations, but with greater meaning and potency because of their time-testedness and allowance for a slow, evolutionary progression within a society.  Such expressions allow for a blunt statement which removes all doubts as to meaning; and the statement itself is all that is necessary, with surrounding silence revealing all.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, a person contemplating initiating the administrative process of filing for Federal Disability Retirement must ultimately come to the decision of moving forward, or not.

Such a bifurcation of clarity in making the decision is necessary both for the sanity and health of the Federal or Postal employee who must make the decision, as well as for the agency who either wants full productivity from its employees, or an ability to “accommodate” the medical condition (in accordance with the governing laws concerning the legal issue of accommodations in the workplace) in order to reach an acceptable level of productivity.

Fish or cut bait; in four words, such a colloquial expression says it nicely:  Initiate the process, or live with the pain and progressive deterioration.  Already, in the very act of trying to explain or “add on” to the expression, nothing of value has been accomplished because the expression itself is sufficient.  As such:  silence.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

OPM Disability Retirement: The Durational Attitude, Or: “If Only I Had…”

There are periodic offers for an “early out”; or the ability upon reaching certain trigger points of leaving the Federal Government; or receiving OWCP benefits, which is certainly a higher rate of immediate return (assuming qualification and eligibility has been established); or even a settlement for a separation with some severance pay, a lump sum to settle a lawsuit, etc.

On the other hand, one of the advantages of a Federal Disability Retirement benefit, of course, is that the number of years which one remains on Federal Disability Retirement counts toward the total number of years of service, such that at age 62, when the Disability Retirement benefit is recalculated as regular retirement, those years on Disability Retirement are calculated into the benefit. Thus, for those who live to be a ripe old age, those differences in percentage points will continue to reap the benefits.

It is the long-term viewpoint which should always be considered; for, in later years, the durational perspective, if not taken, may well result in the rueful reminiscence of a forlorn, regretful attitude.  One may make statements of vacuity, such as, “I don’t live with regrets”; but the annuity and one’s bank account may tell a different story.

Planning for the future in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether under FERS or CSRS, from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, entails, involves, and encapsulates more than just the “now” and the “present”; it is the immediacy of the future which one should always plan for.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

OPM Disability Retirement: Respite and Reflection

Sometimes, it is a positive thing to have a period of respite, in order to engage in a reflective mode of thought.  The “to-do list” is always extensive and pressing; the need to advance, to accomplish, and to complete the pending projects is always in the foreground; but a period of respite and reflection — a pause in the action of life — is a welcomed break.

For those Federal and Postal employees who are contemplating filing for disability retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, it is often merely an extra day in which to recuperate one’s energies in order to go back to work.  If the Federal or Postal employee finds that the period of a few days off are merely a palliative form of treatment in order to drag one’s self back to the identical state of affairs at one’s Federal position — whether because of chronic pain, or profound, overwhelming fatigue; or perhaps an intractable state of cognitive decline and depression — it is probably time to think about filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

One can “fight the good fight” only for so long.

At some point, the coalescence of the medical condition, the limitation of human capacity, and the self-destructiveness of continuing in a position which is detrimental to one’s health, will come to fruition.  Preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, is perhaps what one should reflect upon during the respite of life.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
OPM Medical Retirement Attorney

 

Federal Employee Medical Retirement: The Knowledge of Others

It is often the spouse, or even the unnamed friend, who comes to recognize the need — even before the Federal or Postal employee.  Whether because of the distance between the person and the medical condition, or out of pure empathy, the “other person” knows that it is time to file for FERS Disability Retirement.  When that knowledge is conveyed to the person who actually suffers from the medical condition itself, then it is beyond the point of filing; it is, indeed, time to file.

In preparing, formulating, and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the truth of the matter is that shirkers are rare, and a premature filing of a Federal Disability Retirement application is rarer still.

Federal and Postal employees who file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits wait until the point at which self-destructive continuation has already passed.  In fact, in many cases, the applicant’s own treating doctor has already repeatedly advised to “change jobs”, “switch careers”, “do something else in life before you really damage yourself“, etc.

That is why there is a (rightful) sense of injustice and unfairness when the agency itself is taken aback, and acts as if there is some nefarious motivation underlying the filing of the Federal Disability Retirement application.  However, what is important, as in all matters of importance, is the self-knowledge that it is indeed time, and those who question one’s motive know not what one’s family, friends, and caring “others” have already determined.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
OPM Disability Attorney

Medical Retirement for Federal Workers: The Unplanned Event

One always likes to think of the present state of affairs as one resulting from the systematic planning put in place years ago — as in the proverbial “comfortable retirement” that was set in motion through wise investments and retrospective prognostications which were presumably based upon sage advice.

But life rarely works that way.

Yes, the analogy of the treadmill, or of taking one step forward and two steps back, all apply.  There is a famous line in a British rendition of “Emma”, in which the father mumbles beautifully, “Life is like going from one bowl of gruel to another”.

Those who come to a point of contemplating filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, often find themselves in a similar situation.  One works tirelessly, thinking that such hard work will reward itself by growing one’s nest egg, where savings develop over time; where within-step-increases come because of meritorious behavior; and where loyalty to, and from, one’s agency is strengthened and established because of the time, effort, and hard work one has, and will, put in.

But then the unplanned event surfaces.

In the beginning, one can fool one’s self and say that it is merely temporary, that it will all go away, and that one needs only to survive for the next coming day.  But the unplanned event can be just as effectively destructive as the planned one, and the results just as final.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, it is best to see the neutrality of one’s circumstances — for, it matters not whether one “planned” for a medical condition; rather, the point is that, once accepted as a fact, it is the extent and effort of planning after the revelation of an unplanned event, which will make all the difference in one’s life.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Disability Retirement for Federal Government Employees: Basics & Complexity

Appearance versus reality; ease of effort as opposed to great physical exertional requirements; basic components which make up for a complex composite — the inverse/converse of oppositional forces may seemingly contradict each other, but in most cases, they are entirely compatible.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the initial encounter with the multiple forms which must be completed, the complexity of the questions requested to be responded to — with the underlying sense that each question contains an implicit “trickiness” where the government is attempting to either cage you into a corner you do not necessarily want to be pushed to, or otherwise to state things which cannot be answered in such simplistic format — all betray a conundrum:  Is it as simple as the questions appear?  Or is the complexity hidden in the appearance of such simplicity?

Then, of course, a partial answer will surface when a Federal Disability Retirement application is denied by OPM at the First Stage of the process:  all of a sudden, various legal criteria are cited; standards of proof heretofore unmentioned are recited like a litany from a food recipe; and by the way, if it gets denied again, you get to read through a thick legal packet concerning your “appeal rights” from the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board.

Yes, it appears simple; it’s only that the complexity remains hidden in the compendium of laws, statutes and regulations which undergird the entirety of the complex administrative procedure encapsulating Federal Disability Retirement law.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Postal and Federal Disability Retirement: Sparing the Legal Argument

In preparing, formulating, and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, there are multiple discretionary decisions to make.  By “discretionary decision“, is meant that there may be differing priorities of values which must be placed in the very process of deciding whether or not to include or exclude a medical document, legal argument, etc., and the prioritizing of the value placed upon such evidence is what will determine the decision itself.  There may ultimately be no “correct” decision on the matter, as opposed to an incorrect one.

Further, one may never know (or care, once an approval of a Federal Disability Retirement application is received) whether or not the Office of Personnel Management made a positive or adverse decision on the Federal Disability Retirement application (whichever the case may be at any given stage of the administrative process) based upon the same priority of values assessed upon the decision itself.

For example, sometimes the evidence itself — whether medical or non-medical documentary evidence — may be compelling enough in and of itself, that making a long and tedious legal argument may in fact detract from the prima facie strength of the evidence itself.  Or, it may be that a short sentence or annotation in a medical document may be so significant that a particular legal argument, however long and involved that may be, should be stated, and stated at length, and argued boldly.

Discretion dictates a restraining of a reactionary response; sometimes, the shorter the statement, the more effective is the presentation.  Length and verbosity alone do not constitute effectiveness in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from OPM.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire