Obtaining Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) is a difficult and complex process. Two out of every three applicants initially are denied. Robert Veneziali was a lifelong electrician until the onset of multiple sclerosis.
 
For eight years Robert Veneziali has battled the progressively debilitating effects of multiple sclerosis. His family saw his suffering, but could do little to get him the help he needed.
 
Thanks to help from the nation’s leading SSDI representation company and prodding from his local congressman, the 38-year-old electrician was finally awarded Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits in March 2008. Now Mr. Veneziali has the financial means to support his family and the hope of medical breakthroughs to ease his suffering.
 
Mr. Veneziali’s prospects have improved from bleak times that reached a crossroads in 2006. Until then, he was on a decade-long rollercoaster ride with fewer physical peaks and ever-deeper, long-lasting lows—symptomatic of MS.
 
Until 2000, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Mr. Veneziali had been an electrician all his life. Then he had an attack that left him unable to walk or talk. He was admitted to a hospital where the doctors diagnosed him with MS. Soon after that, he applied for SSDI, but was denied.
 
One problem, as his mother noted, was that her son did not always look sick. “He would walk with an unusual gait and have a funny look in his eyes,” she said. Yet, for 10 months, he might be able to have a normal life as an electrician. Then, just as suddenly, he would be stricken and spend the next two months in the hospital.
 
“He was fortunate that his employer would give him time off,” Mrs. Veneziali said. “But in 2006 he didn’t recover when he relapsed again.”
 
Mr. Veneziali was married with three children who “were all affected,” he said. “I couldn’t do anything for them because I had to deal with my disease.”
 
Then in mid-2007, he decided to apply for disability again, but this time he decided to get help. “My father and brother own a body shop,” he said, “and one of their clients gave them a card for Allsup.”
 
Mr. Veneziali soon learned he had been directed to the right place – Allsup is the nation’s leading SSDI representation company.
 
He contacted Allsup and started to work with its representatives. From the beginning, he said, they had a good relationship as they prepared for his first SSDI application four years after he was last denied in 2003.

Like many first SSDI application submissions, SSA turned down Mr. Veneziali’s application. Allsup had prepared him for that likelihood, and he and the company prepared for the appeal that might take up to 18 months.
 
However, his wife had had enough. In frustration she called their congressman, Rep. John Hall (D-Dover Plains), who said Mr. Veneziali’s wait for a decision was “unconscionable.”
 
With the congressman’s help, the Veneziali appeal soon had a hearing date before an administrative law judge. “He did it all,” said Mrs. Veneziali about Representative Hall’s intervention to prompt the hearing. “I have to give him all the credit.”
 
His Allsup representative met with Mr. Veneziali to represent him at the hearing and asked him to prepare a two-day diary. This is important, because people often forget how much they have changed their lives to compensate for their disabilities. The diary makes it easier to describe in detail at the hearing what they are going through at home.
 
At the hearing in March 2008, Mr. Veneziali brought along another secret weapon: his mother. Stating his passionate case in no uncertain terms, his mother testified. Afterward the administrative judge indicated he would rule favorably for Mr. Veneziali. A few weeks later, a relieved Robert Veneziali received the favorable decision in the mail. He would receive SSDI benefits, including a lump-sum payment retroactive to August 2006, the agreed date of disability onset.
 
Mr. Veneziali said he was grateful for Allsup’s help and especially for the help from his mother to receive the favorable outcome. He now has hope for supporting his family as well as hope in medical breakthroughs for combating MS.
 
“I’m just trying to fully recover from this,” he said. “With the new medicine, maybe I can get back to where I used to be.”