>> Good afternoon everybody. This is Ray Cibula from Cornell University's Yang-Tan Institute and I'm happy to welcome you to today's WISE event, our work incentive seminar event. We have some great folks with us today to give you some great information about returning to work and balancing that return to work with your public benefits. The end game here is to insure that work pays, that you will be better off working, and that's what we're all about. Work is good and you will have more money at the end of the month. We're going to talk about free services that are available to you if you have a disability. We're focused on folks who receive disability benefits from the Social Security Administration and have Medicaid and Medicare and area ready to go back to work or at the very least want to think about that. We're going to give you some things to think about and hope it spurs you to make contact with some of our folks across the country who can help plan that return to work so we won't be losing anything. Accessing today's webinar. You've been connected automatically through your computer and your speakers in your computer. Should anything happen during today's session, whether there's a storm where you are or you just lose the connection you can call us and that toll free number is 1-855-749-4750. You'll be asked for an access code and that access code is 641696115. You received your power point and an accessible pdf and text with the link that you received to connect to today's webinar so you should have the materials with you. You don't need them but if you want to follow along and make some notes they're pretty handy. Now when we talk about webinars we talk about accessibility a lot and those of those who do them regularly are constantly talking about accessibility. We want you to be able to participate in every facet of today's webinar to the greatest extent possible. We believe we've accomplished that so that nobody should be having any trouble because our system is inaccessible, however we want to know if you're having a problem so let us know if you are having issues and more importantly than letting us know that you're having an issue please let us know if you know of a fix. If you know of a program we can use or something we can do that we're not doing to fix the issue that you're having because lots of times it's something very, very small and we're just not aware of it and we want to know those things. Captioning is happening. I'm watching captioning happening right now in the lower right-hand corner of my screen at the bottom of my Webinar console. To link into that you can link in at www.edi.cornell.edu/ captions.cfm?activity_id=5105. So there are a couple of ways to get into that. If you want to make that panel larger you can do that as well but remember as you make that panel larger you're going to be shrinking the rest of that webinar console and you may be blocking out the Q&A box or the chat box but you will be able to open them again. Just be aware you're going to make other things smaller. Today's webinar, the transcript, and the audio recording will be available in about two weeks on our website in our archive and that archive can be found at www.ilr.cornell.edu/edi/m/WISE-. I did that wrong I'm sorry. I want to go back edi/m-WISE-webinars.cfm. I'm going to ask Jamie to type that into the chat box so you'll all have that. She's probably already done that. We will have a question and answer period at the end of today's webinar so you can submit your questions all during the webinar. I mentioned the question and answer box. In your webinar console you have a Q&A with an arrowhead next to it. If you click on that arrowhead it's going to open the box and here is you're Q&A box. That's the important part. You're going to want to type your question in and hit send. Now there are 500 or 600 people on today's webinar and I can promise you that we're not going to answer all of your questions. Jamie is going to be getting these questions as you send them in and we'll be picking questions that pertain to the largest percentage of the audience. If you have specific questions about your own personal situation we will give you other numbers and other websites where you can find out information pertaining to you. So let's see what else we have to talk about. Here's another situation. Should you become disconnected or should you lose your sound, if you go to the top of the page to where it says audio and click on that, click audio conference and you can use your phone. Again you click I will call in. It will give you that number I gave you, the access code, and you can certainly dial in and listen to us following along with the power point if you have it printed out or if not you can most certainly access that power point later when things are archived. Now we're getting very, very close. Here's our agenda for today but before we get to the agenda and our presentation I have some questions for you. We like to know who you are. We like to know where you found out about us so we have five short, short questions that will take us about five minutes. I'm going to open the first poll and the question is how did you learn about this national WISE webinar? Was it email, Facebook or Twitter, a website, family or friend, a WIPA project or something else, and if you do pick something else toss some information in the chat box or the question and answer box so that we know how you found out about today's session. We'll give you a couple of seconds to get those answers in. The quicker you click the quicker this is over guys. We're getting much closer. A few more clicks and we'll be home. I have to have my scientific percentage guys. A couple of more. All right. When I close that poll you get 20 seconds to get the--, to click again and we'll be all set. Ten seconds left. Okay, we'll go to question two. What do you hope to learn about today? Do you want to learn about the ticket to work, work incentives for SSI recipients, work incentives for SSDI recipients, employment networks and VR services, legal protection advocacy, or something else? And if it's something else again that you want to learn let us know what that is because we have been known to build entire webinars based on your suggestions. These answers are coming in pretty quick. And speakers it looks like you've got your work cut out. Got even numbers across the board. Everybody wants to know about everything. All right gonna shut that down. You've got 20 seconds left to get your answers in. Ten seconds. Okay, and we'll move on to number three. What is your gender, male or female? All right, 20 seconds. Ten seconds. And what is your age? 18 or younger, whoops I've got to open that up, I'm sorry. What is your age? 18 or younger, 19 to 25, 26 to 40, 41 to 55, 56 to 65, or 66 and older? All right that one was real quick, 20 seconds. Perfect target groups for today's session. Five seconds left. And last but not least at times we know that there is more than one person looking at a computer monitor and to help us get a better number of people who are attending today's session, besides yourself how many other people are watching your computer screen with you? Oops I didn't open that. I'm sorry. So besides yourself how many other people are watching with you today? We've got one party going. All right, 20 seconds. Ten seconds. Okay, thank you very, very much folks. Now today we have with us Kendra Berry from Indiana Works and Tina Skeel from Indiana Works. I'm going to let them introduce themselves a little more when they take over this session. They're great--, they're just great. They've been doing lots of webinars with us and can provide you with lots of information. They're both very experienced at this stuff. So we're very happy to have them and we're first going to talk about the Ticket To Work program and Social Security work incentives. Then we're going to talk about building your employment team. Look at this it's happy birthday. Today is the Ticket's 15th birthday. It's been 15 years since that Ticket To Work has been around, and to close out I'll provide you with some other resources and then we'll take some questions and answers. So I'm going to turn it over to Kendra. Take it away Kendra.

>> Hello, can you hear me?

>> Yes we can.

>> Perfect. Sometimes there's an issue with the mute button on these. As Ray said my name is Kendra Berry and I am a community work incentive coordinator with Indiana Works. Indiana Works is the WIPA project for northern and central Indiana and we provide benefits counseling to people for free. What we do is [inaudible] how working will impact your benefits. I am going to explain to you some of the work incentives available to you and some of the agencies that you can work with to learn about how you can return to the work force and how working will impact the benefits that you receive. Social Security has two main disability benefit programs. The first one is Social Security Disability Insurance or SSDI, and this is for people who worked in the past, they paid their FICA taxes, and they're insured under their work record or they became disabled before the age of 22 and are receiving [inaudible]. The other disability benefit program is SSI or supplemental security income and this is for people who didn't work close enough to the time when they became disabled and are receiving the minimal amount of money that the government says that you can provide them. This year the maximum SSI amount is $721 but starting in January it will increase to $733. The reason we are explaining these two programs is because the work incentives associated with them are very different so as we go on a little bit further in the program and discuss the work incentives available it's important to know what type of benefit you're receiving. Some of you may be receiving both SSDI and SSI and this is known as concurrent benefit. The reason that it's so important to know what you're receiving is because the work incentives are different and what you can do is contact your local WIPA project and they'll be able to give you specific information on your case and we'll go over the contact information here in a while. I am going to turn this back over to Ray so that we can get to know Ben.

>> Okay. What we're going to do now is talk with Ben or have Ben talk to us. Ben is a client who is going to walk us through the entire Ticket To Work program and then of course we'll spend some time making that a little bit clearer and give you a little more detail. So Mike if you could cue up Ben's video.

>> Independence, fulfillment, community involvement. These are some of the benefits that work provides. By working you can earn more income, meet new people and learn new skills. What is the Ticket To Work program? How can it help you? Ticket To Work is a free and voluntary program from Social Security that provides you employment support services to help you go to work while still providing access to Medicaid and/or Medicare. It can help you go to work which can give you a greater sense of purpose and help you give back to your community. With time you will be able to replace your cash benefits with your earnings from work putting you on the road to financial independence with the peace of mind that your benefits will be available to you if you need them due to your disability. Meet Ben. Ben qualified for the Ticket To Work program because he is aged 18 through 64 and received Social Security Disability Insurance. If Ben received supplemental security income he would also quality for the program. Ben wanted to work but needed to understand how work would impact his benefits, especially his health care. Ben did some research and found out that over 316,000 people with disabilities have participated in the program. After doing more research he decided that Ticket To Work was just the ticket he needed to be successful in going to work. When Ben contacted the Ticket help line they talked to him about support from Social Security he could use to go to work. He found that with Social Security Ticket To Work and work incentives he might be able to work while keeping his Medicaid or Medicare with the peace of mind that if he needed to stop working due to his disability there would be a fast track back to restarting his benefits. With the Ticket program Ben had a choice of service providers, employment networks and state vocational rehabilitation agencies. He was able to select one of these service providers to work with him one on one to help him reach his work goals. Both could offer him specialized services and he could choose which was right for him. PR agencies work with individuals who need more significant services. The services that Ben could receive include benefits in career counseling, education, training, and job search support. ENs [phonetic] are private or public organizations that may help with career counseling and assistance with job placement and more. Different ENs offer different types of services so Ben could pick an EN that was just right for him. Ben also had the option to receive services from his state VR agency and then when those services end he could work with an EN to receive additional services that would help him find a job or keep an existing job. Ben took some time to think about his options and decided to assign his ticket to an EN. Ben's commitment to participate in the Ticket To Work program forged a parternship between him and his service provider. They both agreed to work together and jointly developed a plan that was just for him. His plan to find his work goals and describe the specialized services the EN would provide or arrange for to help him meet his goals. Ben's road to employment through the Ticket program is a two-way street. In return for assistance in getting a job, Ben pledged to Social Security that he would take specific steps determined by the plan he developed with the EN within timeframes set by Social Security to work at a specified earnings level or complete certain educational or training requirements. Taking the agreed upon steps toward employment with timeframes set by Social Security is called making timely progress. By taking these steps Ben was able to fully take advantage of the support and protection the Ticket To Work program provided. You can be like Ben. The Ticket To Work program is here to help you become and stay employed, meet new people, and you gain fulfillment and financial independence. We know it's a big step but there is so much help for you all along the way. The Ticket program offers many tools and resources to help you learn about starting your journey to financial independence. Are you ready to work? Call the Ticket to Help Work help line at 1-866-968-7842. For TTY call 1-866-833-2967 to talk to know of our knowledgeable representatives or visit www.socialsecurity.gov/work to learn more. Good luck on your journey to financial independence. We are ready to help you on your way. Okay, that's Ben's story and that's the story of the work incentives and return to work. I'm going to turn this back over to Kendra. I can't promise you a jazz band behind you Kendra but take it away.

>> Well I just don't know what I'm going to go if I don't get music with my presentation. The Ticket To Work program is what you just heard Ben talking about and we are going to discuss how the Ticket To Work program can help you to find the job that you're looking for. What you're doing now is the best way to start learning about what the [inaudible] both work incentives be it Social Security, and agency help. You can gather information and the resources that will help you plan your journey to finding the job that's the best fit for you. The Ticket To Work and the work incentives are going to assist you with doing that. When it comes to starting a journey only you can decide if it's the right choice for you. You do not have to work. It's not something that you're going to be forced to do but if you're listening to this presentation then you're considering working. Working is great for a ton of reasons. When it comes to deciding if you want to choose work keep in mind these things. Returning to work will help you to have more money every month to pay your bills and to have a more disposable income. It will help you to gain independence. You won't have to rely on other people and you'll be able to do things on your own. It will also help you to meet new people. You'll be able to interact not only with your coworkers but with other people depending on the jobs that you choose. It will also help you to learn new skills. When I talk to people and they call because they're interested in returning to work, one of the most common reasons that people tell me that they want to go back to work is because they are lonely and they want to get back out there and just have interaction with people and returning to work is a great way to do that. As we go over the Ticket To Work program and the work incentives available to you keep in mind that you're the one who will decide what your work goal is and that includes not only what you want to do but how many hours you want to work and how much you would like to make per hour. The goal at the Ticket To Work program is to help you find the job that you want. The Ticket To Work program will support career development for people with disabilities who want to work. It's for Social Security disability beneficiaries aged 18 through 64 and one of the best-selling factors is that it's a free and voluntary program. As we go over the different agencies you'll be able to work with you will see that you have choices and you are going to be the driver of this program. You get to decide what agency you want to work with, what job you want, and how everything is going to look at the end of the day. So I've mentioned these work incentives a few times and you're probably wondering what is a work incentive? Work incentives are special rules through Social Security that allow you to receive new training for new skills, improve the skills you already have, pursue your education, try out different jobs, start a career and gain confidence. The biggest fear that people have when they call me and they're thinking about going back to work is that going back to work will cause them to lose everything, because you've probably heard from your mother's sister's cousin's brother's uncle that they went to work and all their benefits stopped, and that's just one of the biggest myths that's out there. Social Security has work incentives in place that allow you to go to work and you will be able to keep your Medicaid and your Medicare and your cash benefits won't necessarily just stop as soon as you start working. Let's go to the next slide and look at the most common work incentives available. There are six work incentives listed on this slide and underneath each work incentive you'll see a circle that says either SSI or SSDI, and this is why it's important to know what you're receiving. We're just going to talk about a few of the work incentives. There's a lot more than this and the best way to get information about your situation is to contact your WIPA project and that information can be found at the end of the [inaudible]. You can also find it online by visiting the Choose Work website, and it's a free service. Your work incentive planning and assistance project or WIPA, will be able to verify your specific benefits and let you know exactly what work incentives are available to you based on our disability benefit. So let's start with the earned income exclusion. When it comes to people receiving SSI, Social Security doesn't count the first $85 you earn and after that they only count half. So the example that I like to give people is if you go to work and you make $885, that's a lot of money, it's more than anyone's getting in SSI because again remember the maximum is $721. Social Security doesn't count that first $85 and after that they only count half of your earnings so of the $885 you earn they're going to count $400. So instead of receiving $721 in your SSI check you would receive $321 and that scares people because they think, "Oh my goodness, that's $400 less than what I was receiving". But if you earned $885 and you're still getting $321 in SSI then that means you have over $1100 total which is a lot more than $721. The other benefit to going to work when you have SSI is that you're paying into the system. You're earning credit to become insured under SSEI and SSEI comes with Medicare so it's an additional insurance. Protection for medical continuing disability reviews is available to both SSI and SSDI recipients. In those continuing disability reviews or CDRs it's that paperwork that Social Security sends you every--, usually ever few years depending on what your disability is and you have to fill it out and give information about are you seeing your doctor and what medication do you take. If you assign your ticket you don't have those continuing disability reviews so that's a plus. For SSDI recipients the first work incentive available to you is called a trial work period and the trial work period is a nine-month period where you can earn any amount of money at all and continue to receive your full SSDI check, so if you go to work and you try out working full time and you're earning $1500 a month, for that first nine months you would earn that $1500 and continue to receive your check. So it is a great work incentive. All of these work incentives were created to provide you with a safety net so that if working doesn't work out for you, if you're not able to handle it because of your disability, you're not going to have to be afraid that you'll lose everything. Below the trial work period we have expedited reinstatement and this is for both SSI and SSDI recipients and this is one of my favorite work incentives. Expedited reinstatement says that if your disability causes you to be unable to work within five years of your cash benefits stopping you don't have to reapply for Social Security, you can request expedited reinstatement and your benefits will restart automatically the following month and for a lot of people that is the clincher for them to try working again because I know how hard it is to get disability benefits and a lot of you [inaudible] may have applied for disability and it could have taken two, three, even four years to be approved and to get that check started. Expedited reinstatement knocks out that whole step. You just request the expedited reinstatement and your benefits will be restarted. If you receive Medicaid and decided to go back to work there's a federal work incentive called 1619B and it's continued Medicaid eligibility, and what this does is it--, the example I'll use is Indiana since I'm in Indiana, until your earnings are above $37,000 annually you will remain eligible for Medicaid. So if you are just interested in going to work part time or even full time at a lot of jobs, until you're earnings go above that threshold, and it varies by state, you would want to contact your WIPA to find out what the 1619B [inaudible] for your state, but until your earnings are above that you will have your insurance. So going to work won't cause you do lose insurance. For Medicare recipients, and this is for people receiving SSDI, there's a continued Medicaid coverage or Medicare coverage work incentive and it says that for up to 93 months after the trial work period, so that's almost eight years, your Medicare coverage will continue so going to work won't continue to lose your Medicare coverage either. This is just an example of some of the work incentives available to you. There are other ones out there and the best thing to do is to contact--, you can call the Ticket To Work help line and they'll be able to put you in touch with your local WIPA project. What they'll do is they'll verify your benefits, they'll verify Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, food stamps, HUD, any benefits you're receiving, and they'll provide you with information on all of the work incentives that are available to you, and that is the best thing that you can do when you're starting to consider returning to work. Now that we've discussed some of these work incentives and how the Ticket To Work program can assist you, let's turn this back over to Ray and he can tell you about Megan and her journey.

>> Okay, thank you Kendra. Megan is a bud of ours. She is a success story. She's used her Ticket To Work and she has graciously allowed us to share her story. When you go onto the Social Security website which we'll give you later she has a video and she has been kind enough to speak on some of our webinars and she is just a great all around woman. In 2008 she was diagnosed with clinical depression and ended up staying home for a while and as she'll tell you she just got sick of staying home. That wasn't who she was and so in 2010 she decided she would take a chance. She would use her Ticket To Work and try to go back to work so she made contact with an employment network, which we'll talk about very shortly, to help her and that was the beginning of her putting together her employment team, and she's in Maryland so she contacted an agency called Transcend and what happened with Megan was that she made a very successful attempt back to work and in 2011 was successfully working and had already used up her trial work period and was in her extended period of eligibility and was making enough money so that her cash benefits stopped. Now even though her cash benefits stopped she was still considered a recipient so she still had a connection to Social Security. Two years later in 2013 her work ended and it wasn't because of her disability it was simply a reduction in staff and her unit was closed down. Because she was in her extended period of eligibility to get her benefits started again all she had to do was call Social Security. She did not need to file a new application. She did not even need to use expedited reinstatement because she wasn't that far along the process. She got back onto benefits but that wasn't going to stop her. It's one of those things where she'll admit, "Yep, I hit a pothole but no I'm not going to stop". Right now in 2014 she is a Zumba instructor and she's focusing her work and her new career in self employment so she's going to be doing Zumba instructing and also focusing on exercise programs for the elderly. She is back with a new puppy. She I believe is married right now. She was engaged the last time we spoke with her and I think she's married. She's ballroom dancing again. She's having a ball for herself. She is a true success story and I'm going to encourage you all to go onto the website and look under success stories to watch Megan's transformation because she is out there having a ball for herself right now and is truly a shining example of what this Ticket To Work program can do for a person. That being said I'm going to turn it back over to Tina and she's going to talk about employment networks and putting that employment team together so take it away Tina.

>> All right well thank you Ray. As Ray said my name is Tina Skeel. I'm the director of employment services at Aspire Indiana Community Mental Health Center here in Indiana and Kendra and I are delighted to be here with you today and thankful to Social Security for hosting this event and before I get started I want to put a big shout out to say happy birthday to the Ticket To Work program. It's an honor to be a part of the celebration today. So with that said I kind of mentioned that Aspire Indiana is an employment network here in Indiana. We're only one of over 698 active employment networks in the United States so lots and lots of employment networks out there. In Indiana alone there's 135 providers that provide services through employment networks here to our citizens in Indiana so 135 employment networks here in Indiana. If you are interested in trying to find out what employment provides services in your state we're going to talk about that in just a little bit so if you can hold on just a few more minutes we'll talk about where you can find that. So let's go ahead onto really taking a look at the employment team. Ray kind of alluded to that earlier and there are four basic team members that you need to have on your employment team as part of the Ticket To Work program. So what you'll see, first of all you'll hear me use the term employment network or EN. That is what Aspire is an employment network. We're going to talk a little bit about vocational rehabilitation and just a reminder that in each state your vocational rehabilitation system may be a little bit different so if you've moved from one state to another you need to take a look at those VR systems because they might be a little bit different. We're also going to talk about the WIPA project or work incentives planning and assistance project, and lastly we're going to talk just a little bit about the protection and advocacy beneficiaries for Social Security services or PABS program so we're going to take a look at all four of these and how they work together with the Ticket To Work program. So what is an employment network or EN. So an EN is an organization or agency that enters into an agreement with Social Security to provide free employment services, so there is no cost to you as a recipient of the Ticket To Work program. Secondly an employment network can provide some vocational rehabilitation or training services. There are other services that are also provided to individuals. Those services might be such as specialized training or curriculum through for example in Indiana we have several employment networks that provide assistance with getting your GED or equivalency exam for high school so you might want to look at that. There are all kinds of other types of support services to people receiving Social Security disability benefits with disabilities under the Ticket to Work program. So as we talk about these employment networks you're going to need to ask a lot of questions. So let's go talk a little bit more about an employment network and what services that they actually include. So if we go to the next slide you'll see the list of services that are often provided. Now these are not all inclusive but these are basic services that all employment networks are required to provide and as I alluded to before there may be additional services that each EN can provide and you'll need to do your homework to see what services they do provide. So let's talk a little bit about career planning. As part of the Ticket To Work program an employment network will create an individualized plan with you. What they will do is sit down and talk about what your interests and needs are. They're going to talk about maybe some of the barriers that you've had in the past towards employment and really look at ways to help you be successful in employment. This may include accommodations. Oftentimes I work as I said before in a mental health center and one of the most common accommodations that we usually work with employers on is modified breaks schedule, very simple, it costs the employer very little but often times as an employment network we're working with that employer to set up a modified actual break program so somebody may need a little--, breaks a little more frequently than other folks so we can work that out. Another example of an accommodation that we've set up is for someone who may have difficulty in a noisy environment. There are oftentimes headphones are very helpful. That again is a very simple accommodation that we've worked with. So that's a little bit about career planning. So that employment network is going to work with you very closely to try to set up a plan and assist you in being successful in job placement. Your ticket is actually not assigned until that point in which you have completed that plan. Once you sign that plan you're officially enrolled in the Ticket To Work program. The next option that an employment network can provide is assistance with job leads and job placement. So often times employment networks have special relationships with employers in their area. That employment network may be the opportunity to get your foot in the door. The next option that an employment network can provide is ongoing employment support, so once you get a job with an employment network that employment network is going to assist you long term with helping you in any situation around employment so if something comes up you can contact that employment network and they're there to help support you. The final piece of an employment network may be the benefits counseling. So often times employment networks have specialized staff who can assist with general benefits counseling. For instance one of the kind of tricky parts of when should I turn in my pay stubs and who should I send them to, those employment networks can assist with that. Some employment networks actually have staff that are trained or specially trained to provide Social Security, Medicaid, and HUD assistance, and provide some additional counseling. Now this counseling is not designed to actually take the place of the WIPA project, it's actually there to assist and supplement it so you have two people that are often times helping you to insure that all of your benefits are kept intact and that you're reporting information to the correct people and that you're utilizing all those wonderful work incentives that Kendra alluded to earlier. So let's take a look at the next slide.

>> Tina, if I can interrupt you for a minute.

>> Sure, absolutely.

>> Is this stuff just available to people in Indiana?

>> Absolutely not. This is available to everyone, so as I mentioned before you're going to really want to take a look at what employment networks are in your area. So when we get to that slide we're going to actually talk about how you can use the web page to go look at--, look up your employment networks in your area and what services they provide, because as I said each one is a little bit different but the Ticket To Work program is available to everyone throughout the United States.

>> Okay, thank you.

>> Thank you for clarifying that. Okay, so as I mentioned I said I was going to talk a little bit about selecting the correct employment network and this is kind of part where you really have to be a really good investigator. One, you want to make sure that that employment network is going to provide those services that you need. As you saw earlier there's a general menu of services that all employment networks are required to provide all across the United States so we have a list--, as an employment network we have a list of things that we have to provide and then often times we have several add-on services or have partnerships with other entities within our state, so again this is where you have to put on your private eye hat. So I'm going to give you three basic tips for checking out an employment network. The first thing you really need to do is determine what kind of help that you need or want. For example, and I use the term because I work in a mental health center, if you would like to find an employment network that specializes in working with mental health services or barriers, oftentimes there are employment networks within those mental health centers and so they can provide a wrap-around service. In other situations you might find that an employment network actually specializes in specific areas like working at home. I know of a couple employment networks that they just specialize particularly in work at home jobs. So checking that out and kind of figuring out what services you're looking for. Another thing to remember when you're trying to determine what you need is are you looking for things like extra assistance with education? That's a question I often get and it's one thing that I advise each beneficiary to look at is does that employment network provide additional training for education, and there are few out there, and again it really does take some legwork. The next thing that you want to look at is where do you want services provided? A lot of employment networks are not located within their state but they do provide services directly to beneficiaries in the state. For example I was on the phone last week with someone who worked for an employment network up in Wisconsin but they were providing services to individuals here in Indiana. So they are meeting with those individuals over the phone. So asking the question how will you meet with me? Will you meet with me on the phone or will you meet with me in person? Will I need to come to your office? How often will we meet? So those are some basic questions that you really want to pay attention to. You also probably need to really pay attention and talk to several different employment networks, really interviewing them, trying to find that good match, and you can find that information on the website. I know Ray you're going to talk a little bit about it but I'm going to give you a little hint. If you go to that www.choosework.net that was shown earlier that's going to be where you're going to find this information. Again I've alluded to some questions that you might ask. Here are my favorite ones? How many people have you helped in finding employment? That's a really good question to ask. The next thing that I always like to ask, or advise people to ask, is do you specialize in specific job placements? So again I alluded to do you work--, to you have jobs for working at home? Some employment networks have special relationships with manufacturers so getting to know the employment network is really, really important. So again determine what kind of services you need, talk to as many employment networks as possible and ask lots of questions. Okay that is employment networks. I think we're ready to go onto our state vocational rehabilitation services. So as I alluded to the second player in our team is always the state vocational rehabilitation system. The first thing that it--, there is a menu of services listed here for all states in the United States so again this is a menu of services that are provided by all vocational rehabilitation services throughout the United States. And again just a reminder that each state may administer their vocational rehabilitation slightly different from another but again if you jump on the web you can see the basic services that they provide. So to get things started VR services may include intensive training. This may include training for things such as adaptive equipment. It may actually provide training for things such as a screen reader for somebody who may have a visual disability. Another service that vocational rehabilitation can provide is education so if you need assistance or classes, certification, or a degree, vocational rehabilitation can provide that. The third service vocational rehabilitation may provide is rehabilitation services. That may include things such as physical therapy. They may also provide career counseling and job placement assistance so for instance a vocational rehabilitation service may assist you with linkage to a specific employment provider in your area. And the last piece, vocational rehabilitation also can provide benefits counseling either by the vocational rehabilitation counselor or they may actually assist you with linkage to a provider in your area that could provide services for benefits counseling. All right, well so we've talked a little bit about employment networks and we have talked about vocational rehabilitation and I think Kendra is going to talk to you a little bit more about the WIPA program. Kendra?

>> Okay, Tina I have to interrupt you because I have a question I want to ask now and not wait?

>> Okay.

>> Can you use both VR and an employment network?

>> Absolutely that is a great question. So a beneficiary can actually start out with vocational rehabilitation. For example if you're going to college or you need some adaptive equipment, vocational rehabilitation is a great place to start so when you start your vocational rehabilitation services your ticket is automatically assigned in most states to that vocational rehabilitation agency at the state level and then as you move through vocational rehabilitation services and your case is closed with VR then you actually can choose an employment network to provide that long-term service so as I mentioned employment networks are there to provide long-term services where vocational rehabilitation is a time-limited service so you could use both, hand in hand, to help support you.

>> Okay, thank you very, very much. And now Kendra do you want to talk to us about WIPA?

>> Sure thing. I have mentioned WIPA a few times throughout this presentation as has Tina and WIPA stands for Work Incentive Planning and Assistance and what that means is that the WIPA project is able to give you specific benefits counseling for your situation. Working with the WIPA project has a few different pluses for you as a beneficiary. When you talk to your WIPA counselor they'll be able to help you decide whether the Ticket To Work program is right for you. They will help you understand the potential benefits of employment as a person who receives disability benefits from Social Security while dispelling the myths about working. We talked just briefly about some of the work incentives available and you were able to see that going to work won't cause you to lose everything. What the WIPA project will do is they'll verify your information and then they'll put together a report for you and the report lays out what work incentives are available to you based on the benefits you are receiving. That's how that they analyze work and earnings and show you how it will impact your SSI, your SSDI, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, HUD, all of those benefits, because there are specific work incentives associated with HUD housing and with food stamps. The WIPA project will also help you to understand the services that are provided via the vocational rehabilitation offices or an employment network. Starting with the WIPA project is a great place to start if you are considering working but you're not sure how it will impact you. The WIPA project will be able to not only give you those work incentives but also give you a list of the agencies in your area that can provide service or get you connected to other agencies if you need a different kind of assistance. The last part of your employment team is the PABS and that stands for Protection and Advocacy for Beneficiaries of Social Security. It's a long name and you'll hear it referred to by the acronym a lot of times, just PABS. PABS services are located throughout the whole United States, in the U.S. territories, and the tribal nation, and what it is is it's designed to help SSI and SSDI beneficiaries with disabilities to remove obstacles preventing them from working. It's free to everyone that receives a Social Security benefit or Medicare or Medicaid based on disability benefits. And what PABS can do is they'll work with you if you're having any issues. Say you go to work and an employer doesn't want to provide you with an accommodation that you need. PABS can step in and help you with that. It's kind of like a free legal service available to you and to help you navigate any issues associated with your disability. Another way that a lot of people utilize PABS services is if they're having an issue with an agency they're working with or vocational rehabilitation. PABS can help you not only become a better advocate for yourself but resolve any issues that you may be having. The last thing to keep in mind is that these services are all completely voluntary and free to you. If at any time you decide that you no longer want to pursue this or you don't feel that the agency you chose to work with is meeting your needs you can choose to work with another agency or stop, so it's great to know all of these agencies can help you and all the different programs that are out there. Ray?

>> Okay, Kendra. So when you say that these services are free you talked about WIPA and PABS, what about VR and the EN?

>> VR and EN are free services as well and like we said earlier available all across the United States.

>> Free services, all right, good, thank you very much. Okay now looking back, moving forward as we said it's happy birthday for the Ticket To Work. It was 15 years ago that the Ticket to Work program came into being and actually most of us who are doing the talking here have been working with the Ticket To Work since that time so we've seen it from its infancy into its teenage years and hope to see it continue to grow and be very healthy. Now again December 17, 2014, 15 years, lots of tickets have been used, you know we're talking about 320,000 people who currently have tickets in use which is an incredible number of people and over 30,000 people who have returned to work and actually gone off of benefits, Megan being one of those who is back on track to do that. It's been helping thousands of people who receive Social Security benefits based on disability explore, find meaningful employment, and move towards financial independence. And this is a big deal. We don't just want you to get off of benefits. As Kendra said SSI is paying a maximum federal benefit of $721 this year. We're not in business to get you a job that's going to make you $725 dollars a year. We want you to become financially independent so the plans that people like Kendra are putting together are making sure that you have a living wage and a wage that is going to make you in a better position than did your benefits and they'll also be some discussion about savings. I know if you're considering work right now savings is the farthest thing from your mind but there are protected savings mechanisms, there are matched savings mechanisms, and we want you to participate in all of that so that we can begin to reach for that financial independence. Now I know there's a way to make this bigger and I think--, there it is I did it, how do you like that? Jamie sometimes it works. Okay here we go through the history, the birth of the Ticket To Work, December, President Clinton signed the Ticket To Work Act into law. It's a big Act. The Ticket to Work program that we're talking about is a little tiny part of it. It rolled out, the Ticket To Work program rolled out to all of the states in 2003. It began in a third of the states then reached out in the next year to more states and by 2003 lots of states, all 50, and as Kendra said the tribal nations and all of the U.S. territories participate in the Ticket To Work now and all of these services are available. 800 service providers are making up what we can call the employment team. Now that employment team is very, very important and these are the major players, right? The employment network, the VR, PABS, and WIPA. I'm not sure what WF stands for. The work force centers I'm going to guess that's what that stands for, but there are also other people that you can bring to your team. Your spouse, your parent, a friend to help you navigate this if you want that. They can also be part of this team to help guide you through this entire process. Work incentives. A total of 19 different work incentives. Now that's not to confuse you and not to scare you. That's just to tell you what Social Security is doing to make it easier to return to work. Now Kendra kind of told you this but I'm going to tell it to you right out, most of you have very little to worry about when it comes to medical care, be it Medicare or Medicaid. They're not going anywhere for a very long time. So my best advice is let's focus on the work and we'll worry about what might happen to your health care benefits a long time in the future. The cash benefits Kendra did talk about in detail. The two types, SSI and SSDI are treated very differently and there are lots of work incentives. The Title 2 benefits, the Social Security Disability cash benefits go through phases of work incentives. SSI makes much more sense. As your income increases your SSI decreases and as Kendra said Social Security cares only about less than half of what you earn so you're going to be better off. You cannot be worse off as an SSI recipient who works. Now the Ticket To Work help line which will help you receives 200,000 calls a year. There are people there who have been fully trained and know these programs backwards and forwards and can talk to you just to give you information, what if, or if you do have a specific question concerning your situation they can begin to have that discussion with you and refer you to your local WIPA or your local PABS or a local EN depending on what the problem is. Now section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 just was amended and it's a big deal. It was another celebration for us. Right now we're looking at the amendments of Section 503 as a great source of jobs because it sets a national goal of 7%, so if you receive federal money or are a federal contractor, 7% of your work force should be people with disabilities. That's a very big increase. It's a minimal goal at this point which we hope will see future amendments to increase that but it's going to open up many, many doors for people who are looking for jobs. Remember it applies to federal contractors and they can become--, they can be all kinds of people. People you wouldn't even think who are receiving federal funds could be considered federal contractors. 7% of that work force must be people with disabilities, that's the national goal. That new hiring goal could open up over half a million jobs. We're estimating 600,000 jobs are going to become available because of that amendment to Section 503, so there are going to be opportunities for you. They are going to be there. Now, we are moving into our--, oops how do I--, now I have to figure out how to get out--, oops I made it bigger, uh oh [laughing]. Return. All right I can return to that, return there. I did it. Mike I figured it out. I get a piece of birthday cake. Now we're going to talk about some other resources. We do have some questions. Remember if you have questions get them in the queue now, but I'm going to give you some resources so that you can get in touch with folks. You want to talk to folks, you just want to search around without talking to folks. We have lots of safe ways that you can get information without having to obligate yourself at all. The find help tool at www.choosework.net/findhelp is going to find all of the service providers that you can possibly access. A lot of them are going to be geographically based. Some of them are going to serve national audiences. As Tina said that's up to you. Do you want someone who serves the entire country or do you want someone that just serves your part of the world? You can search by zip code, by the types of services that people offer, which is real important because you want to approach people who are going to be able to serve you. Some people serve different types of disabilities. Do they speak your language? There are many, many, many languages in this country now, English being one of them. Spanish we all know is the second language in the United States, but what about Vietnamese, what about Mandarin? Can the EN provide you with services in the language that you speak? And then what services do you want? What do you need to start with? Do you need an EN right now? Do you need to explore what vocational rehabilitation can do for you? Or do you want to start with Kendra and put a benefits plan together? Do you need legal services so that we want to talk with PABS. Have you been asked an inappropriate question during your job interview? Are you having trouble asking for accommodations or do you want to know how to reveal your disability? When is it necessary? Do you have to at all? How do you get those accommodations? So those PABS folks, probably the ENs, can also help you along with that type of question. For more information call that Ticket To Work help line. If we don't get to your question that Ticket To Work help line is at 1-866-967-7842 and for TTY users 866-833-2967. You can also visit www.socialsecurity.gov/work. The Social Security website is a wealth of information and the work site will provide you with everything that you need to return to work and you can search that website as long as you want without ever having to talk to anybody and learn what you need to learn before you decide to give that line a ring and get the ball rolling. If you want to continue to follow us connect with us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/choosework or follow us on Twitter and we tweet out important things. I'm sure there was a tweet today that said happy birthday Ticket To Work at www.twitter.com/chooseworkssa. Now that brings us to our questions and answers and I'm going to ask--, let's see. I'm going to ask Kendra a question because I think we answered that first one. Kendra, someone's asking about a PASS plan? Can you tell us a little bit about that program and give us an example of what a PASS plan might look like?

>> Sure a PASS stands for plan to achieve self support and it is a way for you to save for work-related goals. A PASS plan is for SSI beneficiaries or SSDI beneficiaries who are able to become eligible for SSI benefits. The way that it works is it allows you to set aside your money and save for a work-related goal and Social Security won't count that portion. So an example is saying you needed to purchase a cosmetology kit. You were going to cosmetology school but you needed you know $1000 to put together a make-up kit, the scissors, things like that. You could set aside earnings from a part-time job, say $400 a month if that was all you were earning. You put it into a separate account, [inaudible] account and Social Security won't count it so instead of them counting a little less than half of those earnings and lowering your SSI check, you would receive a full SSI check and be able to save until you met the goal and were able to purchase what you needed. The PASS is a pretty involved program. It is about a 20-page application and you have to create a separate account. The plusses is this allows you to reach your goals and allows you to save money without impacting other things. Your WIPA project can assist you with setting up a PASS account so I would encourage you to call the Ticket To Work help line and ask about a path to get put in touch with your WIPA project.

>> Okay Kendra that' just opened the can of worms.

[ Laughing ]

Where well do I go now, my God. Can I ask you about an IRWE. Somebody asked about an impairment related work expense. Can you tell me what they are--

>> IRWE?

>> and just give me an example, yeah.

>> Sure. IRWE is an impairment related work expense and this is for people who are on both SSI and SSDI and it will--, Social Security will take into account any out of pocket cost you have related to your disabilities. So examples of this would be medication costs, doctor's co-pays, if you have hearing aids, if you need wheelchair maintenance. Anything related that you're paying for out of pocket that's related to your disability and it doesn't have to be the disability on record. Say your disability on record is [inaudible] but you also have asthma and a mental illness. You could use your asthma medication co-pays, anything. Anything related to a disabling condition you have Social Security will take into account. For SSDI recipients only look at that if you're earning above a certain level per month and for SSI recipients you would want to make sure that you let Social Security know about any out of pocket cost expenses as soon as you go to work. And this is again the WIPA project can assist you with turning this information into Social Security and making sure that it gets counted.

>> Okay, great. And if I'm on SSI how do I go about getting a ticket to work.

>> The Ticket To Work you don't have to have the actual ticket. The actual ticket was mailed out years and years ago and people didn't understand what the program was. So they received that paper ticket and you know they were afraid, they threw it away, they didn't open it, they filed it somewhere. You don't have to have a paper ticket. You can call the Ticket To Work help line and they'll be able to look up for you to say if you have a ticket or not or even if your ticket was assigned previously, they can assist you with learning if you have a ticket, unassigning your ticket, and getting in contact with the new agency to reassign your ticket.

>> Okay, I think I'm going to give you a break now and start asking Tina some questions.

>> Okay. The question is do I get any birthday cake?

>> Jamie's going to give everybody birthday cake.

[ Laughing ]

She's going to ship everybody a piece of cake. They may be little because there are a lot of people out there but she's going to give everybody cake. Okay, if I don't like my EN can I find a new one?

>> Absolutely. While we encourage you to work with your EN if there is an issue we encourage you to talk to whoever it is you're working with specifically with an EN. You can always, if you can't get it resolved with the person that you're working with through the employment network you can always talk to their supervisor and see if you can get that resolved. Most employment networks have a grievance procedure and they should be informing you what that process is as you enter the Ticket To Work program. However if it just isn't working out that's okay. What you can do is actually change employment networks and that process is fairly simple. It will not disqualify you from participating in the Ticket To Work program and all you need to do is call the ticket line to get that process started.

>> All right, and you know if I have my own job lead and just need some, you know benefits planning assistance and I need to know what's going on with my benefits, do I have to have an EN or can I just take the job?

>> You do not have to have an EN but there are so many great things about the Ticket To Work program that we really encourage folks to utilize an employment network so that their ticket can be assigned. So I think I under--, I want to make sure I understood that question correctly Ray?

>> Okay it was basically do you have to use an EN to find a job?

>> Well you don't have to but again assigning that your ticket will I think Kendra talked about earlier the continuing disability review, and that also provides the more people you have on your team sometimes it's good to have a second or third person on your team to help you through that process.

>> Okay, yeah the bigger the team the better as far as I can tell.

>> Yep, indeed.

>> You never--, and I think particularly now with ENs private ENs being able to provide continuing job supports because I just don't think you know what you need when you start that job and having someone who can provide on-the-job support is probably a real good idea, but as you said it's all voluntary and we don't need to do it. Okay Kendra I'm coming back to you. Are the calculations for SSI and SSDI the same for monthly wages?

>> SSDI and SSI are completely different programs and the calculations are very different. I gave an example of an SSI calculation and what that would look like. When it comes to SSDI it's an all or nothing program. Until your earnings are above a certain level every month your SSDI check will continue. This year that amount, it's called substantial gainful activity or SGA, 2014 it's $1070 a month and that's gross earnings so before any taxes. In 2015 it will be $1090 a month. If your earnings are less than that amount then you receive your SSDI check. If your earnings are above that amount at all then your SSDI cash check would stop. And this is where those impairment-related work expenses would come into play for SSDI recipients. Social Security will calculate your out of pocket costs and it allows you to earn more money while [inaudible] to receive your checks. So it's very important to have some sort of benefits counseling before you work so you know exactly how work will impact your specific benefits.

>> Okay, and what about the age range? What's the age range for the Ticket To Work?

>> The Ticket To Work program is for people 18 through 64 but some of the services are for different age groups. The WIPA project can provide benefits counseling from starting at age 14 up until someone hits retirement so it really depends. The best thing to do is to--, again I encourage everyone to call the Ticket To Work help line to ask your questions and to get in touch with someone so they can answer specific questions. Because the age range it's a little wobbly depending on which program you're interested in.

>> Okay, and Tina I have one more question for you. Do any of these programs support the attainment of an advanced degree?

>> As far as any programs that provide advanced degrees, well to kind of summarize that up each employment network is a little bit different. There are some universities that have been involved in the Ticket To Work program and Ray I might have to rely a little bit on you if you know any specifics. I will tell you vocational rehabilitation has been a wonderful partner who has assisted with the advanced degrees.

>> Yeah I have to agree with you on that one. You know when we're talking about any kind of degree and talking about tuition we're talking about a big chunk of change and the most likely suspect to have that kind of money would be the state VR agency so I think that that's probably the most likely place to look. That doesn't mean you can't work with an EN because the EN can certainly connect you with your state VR agency to get that educational assistance while the EN is helping you file for other types of grants, potentially student loans, and Kendra could help you set up a PASS plan to set aside some of your own funds for that purpose as well. So there are lots of ways to do things. We just have to find the most comfortable and beneficial way for your particular circumstances. And we have--

>> Ray--

>> Go ahead.

>> Ray I'd kind of like to add on to that.

>> Sure.

>> One of the other pieces is often times with schooling there are other things that are needed and I'm going to use myself as an example. Going to college is one piece but there may be some assistive technology that might be needed to add onto that and vocational rehabilitation can be a wonderful partner in assisting and obtaining those other items that may be needed to help you be successful in those continued degrees.

>> Great, thank you very much. All right we have five minutes left and I think that what I want to do to celebrate the Ticket To Work birthday is run Megan's video for you. We found Megan's video and it's such a great story and it's such a happy story that I think that's what we should end on today. So Mike if you'd queue up Megan's video we'll watch that and then we'll say our final words.

[ Music ]

>> The last time we chatted I was working for Wellstat which is a biotech company and I was about to make control specialist and then in 2013 in February I actually got laid off so I called Transcend to let them know that I was no longer working and what I needed to do to go back onto my disability and so they set up my Ticket To Work and everything just kind of flowed seamlessly. I filled out some paperwork and let them know and I was receiving benefits that month. I had been teaching Zumba part time in the evenings after work and I let a whole bunch of people know that I was laid off and that I was ready to work during the day and I just started taking more classes and as I did more classes and was teaching more I really fell in love with it even more and decided to actually make it my business. I would definitely recommend the Ticket To Work program to others. I would say don't be afraid to do it. You have really nothing to lose because they only stop it when you're making too much and you know who doesn't want to make a lot, so I say don't let your fear hold you back and I'm the perfect example of someone who started and who got laid off and nothing bad happened. Choosing work has made a big difference in my life by making me feel useful and being able to contribute to other people but also choosing to work has let me help.

[ Music ]

>> All right so there you go. There's Megan's happy ending, still occurring, and as I said she recently got married and is developing her own business that not only teaches Zumba but is doing exercise programs for the elderly. So I want to thank Kendra, I want to thank Tina, I want to thank Jamie for running the questions through, and Mike for making all things webinar work and ask you one last favor. When you do sign off today or when we sign off today there will be a very short survey that will pop up on your screen. If you take 30 seconds to complete that survey it would help us out greatly so once again thanks for spending time with us and have a great holiday season. Take care everybody.