Slowdown In Payment Of Back Benefits In January

     Social Security has posted updated numbers on payments of fees to attorneys and others who represent Social Security claimants. These numbers are important not just for those who represent Social Security claimants. We get paid at about the same time as our client gets paid. If you see a slowdown in payments to those who represent Social Security claimants you are seeing a slowdown in payments to claimants and the growth of a backlog.

     Social Security always has a problem in paying newly approved claimants in January because of the other workload pressure which go up dramatically at the beginning of each year. I had concerns about what would happen this year if no overtime was available. It turns out that some overtime was available but there was still a problem. Backlogs increased dramatically in October 2011 and January 2012. I hope someone at Social Security can tell me that overtime will be available in coming months to keep this backlog from growing but I don't expect that.

Fee Payments
Month/Year	Volume	Amount
Jan-11	34,467	$113,459,847.04
Feb-11	33,305	$107,796,771.38
Mar-11	34,885	$112,463,768.46
Apr-11	48,033	$153,893,755.37
May-11	36,479	$115,159012.77
June-11	33,568	$104,782,743.07
July-11	40,451	$123,981,011.36
Aug-11	35,575	$109,778,785.74
Sept-11	36,159	$109,990,042.36
Oct-11	27,269	$79,526,149.33
Nov-11	32,677	$100,272,851.46
Dec-11	38,447	$116,455,779.95

Jan-12

29,926

$89,749,312.99

     That's a 23% decline between December and January. Here are some January numbers for a couple of earlier years for comparison:

Jan-10     32,226     $111,440,046.23
Jan-09     28,423     $101,128,880.69