A view from someone who takes social security disability claims over the telephone:
This morning I spoke to a cancer patient, a woman with kidney failure, and a young man who had just lost the mother of his children. Each of them thought I was trying to help them. I wasn’t really though, because helping them would take longer than 23 minutes. ...
These are people who need my help to navigate the complex claims system so that they can get a meagre payout. They’re often vulnerable and desperate by the time they reach me. My job is to fill in a new claim form for [benefits] based on the information people give me and then send that form off to the benefit centre where the claim is processed. ...
[F]or me, the only thing that’s really important is how long each call takes. We are measured on our average handling time (known as AHT) and if this slips beyond 23 minutes per call we face performance management, which is code for “you’ll get in trouble”. This involves anything from stern words and increased micro-management from your line manager right up to written warnings and dismissal. ...
[W]e staff are singularly ill-equipped to actually offer any help or support. I have had absolutely no training in how [disability] benefits work. I don’t know what happens when I send a claim to be processed, so I can’t answer any questions about what will happen next or when somebody will get a payment....
[T]here is no break between calls, the headset beeps again immediately and this time it’s a woman with kidney failure. I’m failing her too, and afterwards I will fail the bereaved young father, and this afternoon there will be more and more people I fail to help. And this will continue presumably until the government finally finds a way to do away with benefits entirely, at which point our sick and disabled people will be left with nothing, not even my hurried 23 minutes of script.If something didn't seem quite right when you read this (notice the use of "centre"?), it's because the woman who wrote this works for the British equivalent of the Social Security Administration.
9 comments:
I would be interested to hear from some CRs as to whether there are similar measurements of their times in taking new claims and performance evaluation consequences.
What does the Agency feel is an appropriate amount of time for the taking of a new application?
We have claims scheduled roughly every hour. Taking a solid claim from scratch takes about 45 mins on average. That's about 5-6 appts per day between 9-4. Then you get the internet claims to work on in between your regular scheduled appointments. Nevermind any mail you may have gotten or any other work for people already on benefits.
As for your specific question...usually anything over 1 hour is questionable here. Not to mention, you've doomed your entire schedule unless someone misses their appointment.
If it is an English speaking client who has all the information that is required -- doctors names, addresses, phone numbers, medications etc then it takes about 45 minutes to an hour. non English speakers, missing info have to look up, doesn't understand the system, complex medical history takes up to 2 hours.
It sounds like they do things much differently across the pond. There have been experiments with an immediate claims-taking unit here, but I don't think it was for disability applications. Seems strange that they would just take the application and not make an appointment. Does anyone know if they even have field offices? Looking on their website I'm not sure. https://www.gov.uk/contact-pension-service
There's no official time measurement, but any CR can tell you that the faster you can take a claim, the more hope you have of keeping up with your giant workload.
When the claimant is unprepared (this is normal, a prepared person is a surprise) it's even worse. I feel bad about rushing the person and interrupting them to go to the next question, but it has to be done. It's no wonder some people get wrongly denied but when they are unprepared and I don't have time to sit on the phone while they search their memory and a giant pile of paperwork for the information, their claim is going to go to DDS probably missing critical information.
Our office does send every appointment the paperwork to get prepared, but most deny having received it and if they have, they lost it or haven't bothered to open it. Sorry, but the claimant has to help us help them; we are not mind readers and we can only give you so much time and then we have to go on to the next appointment.
Unfortunately, for many claimants, the reason they can't "get it together" to present their dib info/medical providers/etc is the very reason they can't hold down a job (i.e., are disabled). SSA fails to recognize that, but if the CR writes that on the 3367 as an observation, it could help the case.
I set up a call due to arthritis in my hands (among other places). I woke up that day with what is called "fibro fog," which for me is a groggy, buzzing dizzyness during which I have difficulty walking or just moving my head and my brain doesn't hardly function at all. Trying to come up with the name of something I know I know... putting something in the microwave and 20 minutes later I would go into the kitchen to get something to eat, realizing then that I've got something in the microwave!
One of the claimants appearing before me recently had a breakdown. She is no longer of any use to anyone, including her self. She is 53 years old and intelligent. She was working for Bank America as a credit card rep, taking phone calls from clients with credit card problems. She had 243 seconds to handle each call or she would have a management discussion as to why she takes too long. They broke her. They ruined her. I paid her, but her life is ruined.
capitalism is ugly
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