OIG Report On Rep Payees

     Social Security's Office of Inspector General (OIG) has issued a report on the agency's efforts to police organizational and volume representative payees. Representative payees handle funds for claimants who are judged to be incapable of handling funds. The report talks about abuses by some of these larger rep payees. Social Security does not always obtain reimbursement from abusive rep payees. Sometimes, the agency allows a rep payee who has misused funds to continue to be a rep payee. This is sometimes appropriate if the misuse was minor and unintentional. The agency is supposed to reimburse claimants who are the victims of rep payee abuse but sometimes fails to. 

     On the whole, I'm sure the agency could do better but rep payees have always been and will always be a problem area for Social Security. It's hard to get people to be rep payees. There's only so much the agency can do. The problems identified are, in my opinion, minor.