Estimate A Claimant’s Social Security Offset

A Claimant can draw Workers’ Compensation benefits and Social Security disability benefits at the same time, but the combined benefits cannot exceed 80% of their Average Current Earnings. To extent the combined benefits exceed that 80% figure, in Georgia, the Social Security benefits are reduced. This can often result in a loss anywhere from a few hundred dollars per month to over a thousand dollars per month. Over the lifetime of a Claimant, this can be a lot of money. A settlement of the Workers’ Compensation should include “Hartman language,” which, on paper, pro-rates the Claimant’s benefits over their lifetime. Social Security will then recalculate the benefit amount and will increase the benefits retroactive to the date of settlement approval. This “mediation magic” as I’ve referred to it in the past, is often a critical piece of information which creates a win-win for both sides and moves a case from impending impasse to settlement. For this reason, we have created this Social Security Offset Estimator.  The full monthly SSDIB amount can be obtained from (1) the Employee/Claimant’s Notice of Award, if they have already been accepted on Social Security Disability, or (2) their Social Security Statement (which can be found at www.ssa.gov in the my Social Security section), if they have not yet been accepted on Social Security Disability.

Average Current Earnings (ACE) will usually be the average monthly earnings based on the single calendar year of highest earnings from covered employment. This single calendar year can be the year that the disability began or any of the five years immediately preceding the year the disability began. The offset is calculated using 80% of ACE as the maximum amount payable in combined workers’ compensation and Social Security benefits (cost of living increases are excluded from the offset). If you have a Notice of Award from the Social Security Administration, it may have already performed the computation to arrive at 80% of the ACE. It this is the case, you need to multiply that number by 1.25 to arrive at the ACE for input into the estimator.

The offset potentially continues to full retirement age. However, it should be noted that the workers’ compensation benefits may end after 400 weeks from the date of injury (plus any additional weeks for a PPD rating) if a case has not been declared catastrophic. The time is shortened to 350 weeks (plus any additional weeks for a PPD rating) if there is a proper filing of a WC 104. The “lifetime” offset shown on this estimator does not take into account these shorter durations, and this should be considered in applying this information to a specific case.