A vocational expert can be crucial to winning your disability claim. Watch this video to see disability insurance attorney John V. Tucker describes the top three reasons you need a vocational expert’s report for your long term disability claim.
If you are filing a long term disability claim, then you need a vocational expert. There are three reasons that you need a vocational expert’s report to help win your Long Term Disability claim. Who are vocational experts? Vocational experts are individuals who are trained to place people in jobs. They typcially have a Master’s degree in counseling, and they evaluate your education, work experience, and any medical problems that you may have. This helps them to evaluate the type of work you can do.
Reason #1: Vocational experts are better qualified than doctors to give opinions about why you can’t work or if you can work at all. Doctors are trained in healing. They can tell you how you might be limited or what your restrictions are, but they are not qualified to determine whether you can work.
Reason #2: The insurance company will have its own vocational expert. Their expert will most likely say that you can work. Without your own vocational expert, you are stuck with their opinion.
Reason #3: You need someone who can explain your story. A vocational expert who considers all of your medical information, your work experience, and any witness statements. With all of this information, they can give an opinion about why you can’t work. Without that opinion, the only one left is that of the insurance company, and it’s not going your way.
If you want to talk with an experienced Long Term Disability attorney about how a vocational expert, call us at (866) 233-5044.
Video TranscriptThe top three reasons why you need a vocational expert report in your long term disability claim. I'm John Tucker. I'm a disability attorney who handles cases like yours all over the United States. I want to tell you the three main reasons why you must have a vocational expert report in your disability claim.
Let’s start with what's a vocational expert. Vocational rehabilitation counselors are people who typically have a master's degree and they have a PhD, but they're trained in the field of vocational rehabilitation, which is a type of counseling that works to get people back to work. So what they do is they evaluate your past education, your work experience, and they look at your medical problems to determine what type of work you can do.
The first reason you need a vocational expert is because doctors are not qualified to give an opinion about why you can't work. They may be qualified to give opinions about how much you could sit or stand or lift or how much you can focus or concentrate. But, doctors do not have training in vocational rehabilitation. They have training in healing and that's what they do best. But they're not trained to give an opinion about why you can't work or that you can't work at all.
Second, the insurance company is going to have a vocational expert. You can bank on it. You can also bet dollars to doughnuts that the vocational expert is going to say you can work, so you need your own expert. That’s the third reason. You need somebody who can tell your story. You need a vocational expert who can take all of those medical records, who can take the information about your education and your work history. They can take witness statements who talk about what you can and can't do. They can put it all together and they can give an opinion about why you can't work.
If you don't have that opinion, all that's left is the opinion that the insurance company has. And their vocational expert, as I said, it's not your friend. That person's going to say that you can work. So you need to get your own expert. If you want to talk about hiring a vocational expert in your case, call me at the number on your screen. I've handled cases like yours for over 25 years all across the United States. I'm John Tucker. Thanks for watching.
