California Department of Social Services - State Hearings Division
Notes from the Training Bureau - July 6, 2005

If a claimant requests a hearing following a conditional withdrawal, is this request treated as a new request for hearing, or treated as a reopening of the initial hearing request? The State Hearings Division (SHD) policy is as follows:

If the claimant requests a hearing before the county has issued a new Notice of Action (NOA) after the parties entered into a conditional withdrawal, then the hearing request is treated as a reopening of the initial hearing request. The case number would remain the same as the initial hearing number.

If the claimant requests a hearing after the county has issued a new NOA following a conditional withdrawal, then the hearing request is treated as a new hearing and given a new hearing number.

If the SHD erroneously assigns a new case number when the claimant requests a hearing before the county issues a new NOA, a judge should hear the case, but have the case number revised to the initial case number. Similarly, if the SHD erroneously assigns the initial case number to a hearing request made after the county has issued a new NOA following a conditional withdrawal, a judge should hear the case and have a new case number assigned to the case.

Under no circumstance should a case be postponed or dismissed because the hearing request was assigned an incorrect number.