It is exasperating to observe how unilateral and “unfair” deadlines are treated for Federal Disability Retirement applications, whether under FERS or CSRS, for Federal and Postal employees.
There are, of course, the “hard” deadlines — of filing for a Request for Reconsideration (30 days — to be on the “safe” side, from the date of the letter of denial from the Office of Personnel Management); for filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (1 year from the date of separation from Federal Service); of filing an appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board (again, to be on the “safe” side, within 30 days from the date of the denial from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management); and similar hard deadlines.
Then, of course, there are the “softer” deadlines, of responding to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in substantive form — of submitting additional medical documentation within 30 days, and similar such “softer” deadlines. They are “soft” deadlines only because the U.S. Office of Personnel Management will not get to one’s file and begin the process of review, evaluation and analysis until well beyond the passing of the so-called deadline.
The frustrating part of it all, of course, is that while the Federal or Postal applicant is restricted by both hard and soft deadlines, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is oblivious and unaffected by any deadlines whatsoever. However, the optimistic viewpoint is to see the “soft” deadlines as opportunities to submit additional medical documentation, arguments, and relevant evidence, any time during the process — before, or even after, either a “soft” or a “hard” deadline comes about.
There is one exception, however: the Statute of Limitations. In that event, as the undersigned has repetitively stated, unless one meets that one particular deadline in form, there is no basis to make any substantive arguments, because the Statute of Limitations is the point of essence where form and substance coincide.
Sincerely,
Robert R. McGill, Esquire
Filed under: Clarifications of Laws or Rules | Tagged: a window of opportunity to make your fers disability claim stronger, attorney representing federal workers for disability throughout the united states, disability retirement at the USPS, disability retirement from the USPS, don't forget the 12 months statute of limitations in usps medical retirement, Federal Disability, federal disability lawyer, federal disability retirement, federal employee disability, FERS Disability, FERS disability retirement, filing for federal medical retirement in emergency, filing for OPM disability retirement, important deadlines for injured federal employees, important fers/csrs disability retirement deadlines to keep in mind, in emergency filing you have to worry about opm deadline first, law firm representing clients in opm disability law all across america, making sure of meeting all the relevant deadlines during the federal employee disability process, meeting an appeal deadline, nationwide representation of federal employees, no deadline for the opm to process disability retirement claim, OPM disability retirement, owcp disability retirement, Postal disability, postal service disability retirement, representing federal employees from any us government agency, several deadlines and all upon the csrs/fers disability applicant, statutory requirements in OPM disability law, two kind of deadlines during the federal disability process, USPS disability retirement, viewing opm disability deadlines as opportunities to strengthen your claim | Leave a comment »