Letters from Abt Associates (Abt) tell POD participants to contact either the POD Call Center or their POD work incentive counselor (WIC) to report work activity. If a POD participant contacts an FO, PC, or the N8NN with questions about the POD project,

POD participants may be concurrently entitled to Title II and Title XVI benefits and will be required to report their earnings to Abt for Title II and their FO for Title XVI purposes. If a POD participant attempts to report Title II work to the FO, PC or N8NN, please follow the instructions below:

POD participants were exempt from work CDRs while participating in the POD. Instead, SSA evaluated earnings outside of eWork and applied offset using the POD Automated System (PAS). eWork generates the following warning message when trying to initiate a work CDR for a POD participant during the POD participation period:

“POD Participant. The beneficiary is currently in the POD program. Access to eWork – Initiate/Update Work Review is restricted. Refer beneficiary to the POD Call Center 888-771-9188.”

FOs and PCs can reopen or reconsider a determination in eWork made prior to the start date of POD participation (found on the DCF). The reopening or reconsideration is for a closed period and will only evaluate earnings up to the end date of the last review period. Earnings from the month after the prior review period end date to the date of current effectuation are not evaluated.

eWork may allow a technician to input earnings during the POD participation period when performing a reconsideration or reopening, however the earnings are not used in the determination. The “Earnings and Events” screen in eWork will show all earnings input, but will not record a TWP/EPE or IRP code as a Decision Event Code for earnings posted during the POD participation period.

NOTE: Once a beneficiary completes POD participation, all reopening or reconsiderations of pre-POD determinations are restricted.

A beneficiary participating in the Ticket to Work (TTW) program was eligible for the POD. However, the POD will applied an alternate rule for issuing payments to a qualified service provider assigned a ticket by a POD participant in treatment groups 1 and 2.

The outcome period for a POD participant will started after all Phase 2 Milestone payments were paid. Since there were no work CDRs during POD participation, outcome payments are determined by averaging posted earnings from one of two internal systems available to SSA: state quarterly wage reporting or annual IRS reporting. If averaged earnings are above the standard SGA threshold, then the Employment Network (EN) qualifies for payment. While the SGA threshold determines outcome payments, the POD does not make a formal SGA determination. Therefore, outcome payments are not tied to benefit suspension.

Payments to EN providers for POD participants are automatically evaluated on a quarterly basis as part of the existing ePay process without the EN having to submit proof of earnings in the usual manner.

The maximum of 36 total payments for SSDI beneficiaries, whether through a combination of milestone-outcome payments or all outcome payments, still applies.

POD participants assigned to treatment group 2 would have their entitlement to SSDI terminate if they experience a period of 12 consecutive months in full offset (that is, their benefit is reduced to zero). In these situations, they remained a participant in the POD, but were not eligible for the $1 for $2 offset until they become re-entitled to disability benefits through a new claim or EXR.

If POD participants became re-entitled to SSDI, they resumed eligibility for the $1 for $2 offset beginning with the new month of entitlement (MOE), as long as they still had months remaining in their POD participation period.

A beneficiary re-entitled through a new claim was subject to TWP regulations beginning the month after the POD participation period ends.

A beneficiary re-entitled through an EXR claim will began the Initial Reinstatement Period (IRP) the month after the POD participation period ends.

NOTE: EXR or initial disability applications must meet regular SSDI rules for approval. POD did not offset provisional benefits for EXR claims.

A beneficiary that participated in the POD was still subject to medical CDRs.

These instructions will assist you when you encounter situations where special processing applies:

Normal processing procedures apply for all fraud cases. A POD participant will remain in the POD during the investigation and processing of fraud allegations. However, if the decision involves removing earnings that affected the offset decision, we will modify our decisions accordingly. For more information on handling fraud, see DI 11006.025.

When POD participation ends, the beneficiary reverts to regular SSDI rules for work the following month. We may need to process a work CDR following POD participation in order to evaluate SGA level earnings. If processing a post-POD work CDR, follow these steps:

1. 1. 

   Initiate Work CDR: eWork will identify the beneficiary as a Prior POD Beneficiary;

2. 2. 

   Develop earnings for the post-POD review period only: eWork will set a review start date for the first month after POD participation ends. Do not develop or input wages in the POD participation period; and

3. 3. 

   Do not attempt to reopen any prior decisions: eWork will restrict the reopening of any decision prior to POD.

NOTE: Excuse all earnings from the last recorded decision in eWork through the end of POD participation from regular rules SSDI evaluation. It is important to evaluate earnings within the new review period only in eWork.