Disability Benefits for Customer Service Representatives
From those who take calls and assist customers from a call center to workers who walk the aisles of major department stores making sure that guests’ needs are attended to, there are a wide variety of people who work as customer service representatives. In fact, customer service representative is one of the most common occupations in the United States.
While the exact duties and responsibilities expected of customer service representatives may be very different from one job to the next, all customer service representative jobs include taking care of the immediate needs of the employer’s clientele.
Currently, there are more than two and a quarter million customer service representatives working in the USA and that number is expected to increase slowly but steadily over the next 10 years. Those seeking employment as customer service representatives have an excellent opportunity to find work, as there are generally more job openings that there are people competing for the jobs.
Depending on what company you work for and what exactly your duties include, customer service representatives may be considered sedentary workers, or may be considered to fall into any of the categories of physical work (light, moderate, heavy). For example, a customer service representative at a lumber yard may be performing moderate or even heavy physical work, while a customer representative working in a call center is likely performing sedentary work.
The kinds of disabilities which can hinder workers from continuing to work as customer service representatives are as varied as the jobs themselves. Unfortunately for those applying for Social Security Disability benefits, in order to qualify as disabled by the SSA’s narrow standards, you must prove that you can no longer perform the job you had been doing or any other similar job which may be available in the country. In other words, if you are a customer service representative, you generally need to show why you are no longer capable of performing any customer service representative jobs which are available.
Working with a Disability as a Customer Service Representative
If you find yourself with a disabling condition which makes it impossible to continue your work as a customer service representative, you may qualify for Social Security Disability programs such as SSDI or SSI. This is true whether your disability was the result of an injury at work or not.
Some illnesses and injuries (i.e., Alzheimer’s disease and certain forms of cancer) are severe enough that anyone who has them will qualify for Social Security Disability benefits automatically. Most conditions, however, need to be considered on a case by case basis. Generally speaking, in order to qualify for Social Security Disability benefits, you must show that you are no longer capable of producing any kind of work which you have performed up until now and that you are incapable of performing other types of work for which you could be reasonably trained, given your age, level of education, and other relevant factors.
Filing for Disability as a Customer Service Representative
This can be particularly problematic for people who work as customer service representatives because different customer service positions have very different requirements as far as the levels of physical and mental exertion which are demanded of employees. If you are applying for Social Security Disability benefits and have worked as a customer service representative, you should seriously consider hiring an experienced Social Security Disability attorney to handle your claim and appeal for you.
When you are applying for Social Security Disability benefits, you need to be prepared to play the waiting game for at least two to three months. Having a qualified Social Security Disability lawyer handle your case can expedite things somewhat, but it can still be a long, dragged out process, even under the best of circumstances. If your initial claim is denied (and most are, especially when the claimant does not have representation), you will need to go through the appeals process. Again, a Social Security attorney who has experience working with customer service representative’s claims provides your best chances of eventually winning your appeal.
Consider this example: a customer service representative from a call center is injured and can no longer sit for long periods of time. Unless his claim shows that he can no longer perform any customer service job (including many which don’t involve sitting down for long periods of time), his claim is likely to be denied. An experienced Social Security Disability representative who knows the SSA system could make this claimant’s life a lot easier simply by knowing what kind of information the SSA is likely to consider in his case.
If you think you may be qualified for Social Security Disability and would like to have an experienced Social Security Disability lawyer review your case, all you need to do is click the "Free Disability Evaluation" link at the top of the page and submit our fast and easy online evaluation.
