Disability Retirement for Federal Government Employees: Events

Society often proceeds in starts and fits; from one event to the next; from a noted day off on a calendar; from that three-day weekend to the next; from a noted celebration; and time is then marked off and set in our minds as details to fill into the wide linear void of time. But chronicity of medical conditions counters such attempts to neatly bifurcate time into segments of comprehensible packages, precisely because there is no break in the duration of progressive deterioration.

Chronic pain is an equalizer of time; it negates and nullifies, and throws one into the deep abyss of a time when time did not exist; of a prehistoric state of being where sensation, events, environmental dangers and the necessity to survive by reacting consume and overwhelm any sense of segments of time.  Civilization and societal niceties create the neat packages of time-oriented existence; like pristine lawns in a suburban neighborhood, property-lines establish our lives like time-lines on an itinerary of a corporate employee.

How does one break that abyss of timelessness?

Federal Disability Retirement through the Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, allows for that recuperative segment of time in which a Federal employee may turn to, in order to break the chronicity of a progressively deteriorating medical condition.

At least Federal and Postal employees have that option.  For many in the rest of society, the niceties of a segmented life will continue to determine one’s ability to escape that prehistoric time of timelessness.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Disability Retirement for Federal Government Employees: Random Decisions

Waiting is indeed a requirement in the entire administrative process of preparing, formulating, then filing for Federal Disability Retirement Benefits, whether under FERS or CSRS, from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

As this author has repeatedly noted previously, if patience is a virtue, then it necessarily follows that Federal and Postal employees must be the most virtuous of individuals, for the very act of waiting for a decision from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management mandates such a virtuous response from the Federal or Postal Worker who has filed for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

Is there a systematic and logical basis in the sequence and order of the decisions which are being made?  Perhaps.  Stories always abound, of course, of specific instances where a Federal Disability Retirement application was approved within a very short timeframe, but without knowledge of the specifics, including whether the facts included exigent circumstances beyond everyday occurrences, one cannot make a determination as to why an “exception” to the sequence of decision-making was made, if at all.

From an outsider perspective, it appears that the sequence of decisions made by OPM is rather random.  Yes, there is somewhat of a pattern of first-in, first-out, but of course that depends upon whether or not such a pattern is based upon the assignment of a CSA number from Boyers, PA or at the entry point of being assigned to a case worker in Washington, D.C.

The randomness can be troubling; waiting is a frustrating part of the process; but beyond that, virtue can be tested beyond the limits of reasonableness.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

OPM Disability Retirement: In a Perfect World & Secondary Constructs

In a perfect world, one can propose a hypothetical construct where efficiency of service occurs without thought; where administrative processes are available without glitches or unforeseen hazards; and where the workplace environment is daily supportive and sensitive to the needs of injured and disabled workers.  But of course the corollary of such a construct is that, if indeed a perfect world existed, then much of the world which is established to combat, prevent and counteract the imperfect world would have no need to exist.

It is similar to the problem of those in philosophy who attempt to argue as follows:  How do we know that the world before us is not merely a dream? The answer:  The very reason why we can distinguish between dreams and reality, is presumably because we must first acknowledge the reality of the world; dreams are secondary; the mistake we make is when we make that which is primary into a secondary construct.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the Federal and Postal employee who is engaging the services of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management should be well aware that they are not entering a perfect world.  This is a world of administrative nightmares; of expected denials and delays; and further, a world which is neither sensitive to, nor recognizably aware of, the underlying human suffering which accompanies each and every Federal Disability Retirement packet.

Further, in preparing a Federal Disability Retirement case, it is important to keep the essential elements of a Federal Disability Retirement application in a streamlined, focused presentation; otherwise, if you present the argument as a dream-like world, you will get a return response in a nightmarish fashion.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire