Big Backlogs In Florida

     From "ClickOrlando" which is apparently what some television station chooses to call its website:

According to the Florida Disability Benefits Center, 65 percent of the [Social Security disability] applications they receive are initially denied. And in the state of Florida, it can take anywhere from one to two years to get a disability hearing, and even longer to get a decision. ...

According to the FDBC website, it can take anywhere from 376 to 682 days to obtain a disability hearing. It will take an additional 45 to 90 days to receive a decision on the disability claim. ...

In the Orlando, office, which serves the Kissimmee, Lake Mary, Leesburg, Ocala and Orlando field offices, the average processing time is 502 days. In the Fort Lauderdale ODAR office, it takes an average of 376 days to schedule a disability hearing before an administrative law judge. In the Fort Myers office, the wait is 11 months. In the St. Petersburg office, it's 13 months. And the Tampa office is 682 days. ...

So we took our research one step further and searched the Social Security Administration data on average wait times until a hearing is held. According to their records, for the month of May 2017, here's how the averages break down. The shortest wait time is 14 months in Fort Myers. While the longest wait time is 23 months or 699 days for the Miami office. ...