Get Latest WorkWORLD

Workers' Compensation and Public Disability Benefit Offsets

Ordinarily, disability payments from other sources do not affect your Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI - Title II) benefits. But, if the disability payment is Workers' Compensation (WC) or certain Public Disability Benefit (PDB) payments, your SSDI benefits may be reduced. Also, if other family members receive benefits based on your earnings record, their benefits may also be reduced.

Your SSDI benefit will be reduced so that the combined amount of the SSDI benefit that you and your family receive plus your workers' compensation payment (and/or public disability payment) does not exceed 80 percent of an amount that SSA calls your "Average Current Earnings (ACE)". A reduction of SSDI benefits in these circumstances is called an "offset."

Offset procedures can be quite complex and vary from State to State. There are generally two types of offset: regular and reverse.

Regular Offset: A regular offset reduces your SSDI payments because you also are entitled to receive a Workers' Compensation (WC) payment or a Public Disability Benefit (PDB).

Reverse Offset: A reverse offset reduces WC and/or PDB because of your entitlement to an SSDI benefit. Reverse offset only applies to Workers' Compensation and/or Public Disability Benefits in certain States. See Reverse Offset States for a list of those States. For most States only regular offset rules apply. And even for most States which have valid reverse offset plans, the regular offset applies in some situations.

Federal Workers' Compensation payments are also subject to offset according to regular offset rules. (WC benefits are usually State benefits, except for Federal employees who are injured on the job.)

The jurisdiction of the plan that pays your benefits, NOT your personal place of residence, determines what offset rules apply. For example, a resident of Louisiana (which is a reverse offset state) is injured while working for the government under the Federal Employees' Compensation Act (FECA). That employee is subject to regular offset under Federal WC rather than Louisiana's reverse offset.)

If you need more information about workers' compensation or public disability benefit offset provisions, see one or more of the following topics:

·        Workers' Compensation

·        Public Disability Benefits

·        Regular Offset

·        Reverse Offset

·        Average Current Earnings (ACE)

·        Month of Entitlement

·        Reverse Offset States

·        Private Pensions or Insurance

·        PDB exclusions

·        Benefits Not Subject to Offset

·        Regular Offset - Special Situations

·        WC, PDB or Private Disability Plan?

·        Lump Sum Allocation

If you are seeking information about offset provisions relevant to a certain State or principality, look under Reverse Offset States. If the State or principality of interest is not listed in this section, assume that the State follows regular offset procedures and rules. However, your particular situation may still require regular offset if the provisions of the State reverse offset plan do not fully apply to you.

CAUTION: Workers' Compensation (WC) offset provisions of Social Security Disability Law are some of the most difficult to administer (and error prone) procedures covered in the Social Security Act. If you are involved in a WC offset situation, we advise you to study the issues with special care and/or to seek the advice of a competent professional. WorkWORLD gives you information that is applicable in most situations, but is not meant as an authoritative guide to the precise calculation of offset amounts in all situations.

WorkWORLD™ Help/Information System

   Share/Save: Click the button or link at left to select your favorite bookmark service and add this page.

This is one topic from the thousands available in the WorkWORLD™ software Help/Information System.
Complete information about the software is available at: http://www.WorkWORLD.org