Because of inadequate appropriations for its operations and huge uncertainty about how much money it would have to spend from year to year and even month to month, over the last decade Social Security came to rely more and more on employee overtime to get its work done. The overtime usually come in spurts once Social Security got an appropriation. Typically, work would slow to a crawl while Social Security was operating on a continuing funding resolution at the beginning on a fiscal year and would then surge once there was an appropriation. This happened because there was little overtime available during the continuing resolution but once it was over the agency would use overtime to try to catch up.
I'm only seeing the narrow slice of the Social Security Administration that I'm dealing with but my theory is that things are different this year. Yes, I can certainly tell that some overtime was authorized after Social Security finally got its appropriation this year but it seems like far less than recent years. I know that Social Security is doing a good deal more hiring than in recent years. Has Acting Commissioner Colvin changed the priorities in this fiscal year -- less overtime, more hiring?
I have mixed feelings about this change, if it has happened. In the long run, having more employees is definitely a good thing. It gives the agency a better ability to process its workload without the wild swings we've seen in recent years when the overtime spigot was turned on and off. On the other hand, as John Maynard Keynes said, "In the long run, we are all dead." Hiring more people helps but only well down the road. It takes many months to hire and train new employees. Once you finally put the new people to work, they make mistakes that more experienced employees have to sort out. In the short run, the backlogs seem to be growing, not shrinking as they usually do in the first two or three months after the agency gets its appropriation.
What is the situation with the overtime-new employee balance at Social Security? What's the strategy? How consistent is it across the agency?
16 comments:
We have unlimited overtime here at my office for the first time in a couple of years. So as far as I know there is not less available due to hiring.
I can only speak for myself...I have a family and my time with them trumps OT pay. I know for others that's not the case. However, I've seen more of my co-workers passing on OT recently. After a while I'm sure it burns you out.
We've been getting a steady diet of OT since December/January, a few hours available each week. At first it was just for decision writers, but now it's for working up (SCTs), as well. Our office mgmt says there's no end in sight yet.
In my few years here it seems like OT has been available roughly half the time. Maybe a little less, between 1/3 and 1/2 of the time.
unlimited overtime at my ODAR office. Plenty of new hiring in the works...more in the next 6 months than for the past 4 years combined.
9:23 again
I will stress that, at least in my region, OT appears to be office specific. For example, friends in other offices have told me they have gobs of it (2-3 hours multiple weekdays and 6-8 on a weekend day) when my office has much less or none. I think regional HQs and/or Bmore do a good bit of specific targeting. At least for ODAR offices. The field is such a different animal, I have no idea how it works for them.
Pretty much unlimited OT at the AC as well since January. Some new hiring, but nothing like the great stimulus expansion of 2009-10, and so far mostly directed at adding Quality Review staff.
Unlimited OT, as said by some, is an exaggeration, for those in ODAR. ODAR was allotted approx.300k in OT hours. My office has OT, every Saturday, until the end of the fiscal year, but as someone else pointed out people are getting burnt out.
We've had "unlimited" weekend OT. IE 20 hours for AFGE, 18 for NTEU
When a newer employee who is drowning in work asks management for help and the only thing they offer is OT, they get so discouraged. Not everyone wants to, or can, work 50+ hours per week. Those that do can keep up, but those that don't really pay the price in terms of always being swamped. It's not right to hire someone for what the new hire thinks is going to be a 40 hour per week job and then essentially force them to work OT just to keep up. We're so far behind we don't want a new hire because they are so time-consuming.
My understanding is that the next wave of hiring for writers will be for the national hearing offices only during this fiscal year. In the meantime, my office is writing decisions for hearings held three months ago, even with overtime on Saturdays.
Overtime is nothing more than putting a finger in the dike, and ignoring a long term problem. Aside from the fact that employee productivity decreases as hours increase (ask anyone who has ever taken a personnel management course), relying on OT rather than hiring and training new employees burns the agency in the long run as older employees retire.
SSA a few years ago was one of the "oldest" agencies in the government in terms of retirement eligibility and longevity. By not hiring and properly training new people, you're screwing the agency (and the public and stakeholders it serves) down the road. I understand the immediate need for production, but SSA needs a balanced approach to long term planning.
Further, there are some employees who either can't or don't want to work overtime. People have lives outside the office, and some of them actually want to live them.
I work in an inner city office and we basically have "unlimited" OT meaning 2-3 hours each weekday and 5-8 hours on saturday. It makes a massive difference in my ability to catch up on all my work and actually spend some time focusing potential fraud cases. Not to mention a bit extra in my bank account!! :)
Congrats...I prefer to actually spend time with my wife and kids. For those that are single or with adult children, maybe not.
As for the case backlog...it's not going anywhere. When I clear my cases, they give me the cases that the slower employees can't seem to get to...awesome!
One problem with overtime is that, because of the union contract, it has to be offered equally to all employees in a unit (or at least it was during my time--retired 2009). We wasted a lot of precious OT hours on less productive employees who were merely trying to pad their paychecks. Supervisors should be able to decide who gets to work OT and credit hours based on production.
12:28pm March 28.
Amen!
12:28
Can't put all the blame on the union, there. Just like with other personnel actions, your local mgmt has more ability to make moves than you might think. Oftentimes local mgmt is just not motivated to do the documentation, etc. necessary to make such a move, or they get shut down by region. Just ask a candid member of mgmt at the local level--they'll tell you the same thing.
Charles, training new employees to be productive takes years, not months. I know, I was a service rep and a claims rep. The program is very complicated and requires mentors to answer questions/help with difficult work. Employees must learn the rationales and not just depend on the computer. SSA needs to allocate resources now -- sufficient to staff for the next 20 years.
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