... Will SSA provide in-person services during the COVID-19 pandemic?
Date: June 29, 2020
If you have a critical situation we cannot help you with by phone or online, we may be able to schedule an in-office appointment for you. We remain unable to provide service to walk-in visitors due to the pandemic. ...
New Card Requests
We assign the vast majority of SSNs and issue SSN cards at birth. We will continue to process new card requests through our automated processes for newborns as part of the hospital registration process (we call that process Enumeration at Birth). We will also continue to process SSNs and issue cards for certain lawful immigrants [we call these processes Enumeration at Entry (EAE) and Enumeration beyond Entry (EBE)].
If these automated processes are not available to you, we will schedule an in-office appointment for a new card request for those with a critical need. ...
14 comments:
Seems reasonable. Here's hoping the staff and visitors wear masks. I understand that many grown men around the country are giant babies who can't seem to wear them, but the data sure does seem to show they make a huge difference.
So who is going to man the offices. The past few weeks have shown that the younger workers can't be trusted to wear masks.
Given the competitive hiring process, I'd like to think most staff (even the younger ones) possess the requisite intelligence to don a mask properly. But your question is a fair one, nonetheless.
Having been involved in the hiring process for years I can tell you that the hiring process isn't competitive. The pool of applicants that you can hire from is limited.
@9:40
Maybe not younger consumers (although I am one, and I wear a mask), but from what I've seen, younger workers are wearing masks.
Wearing a mask is not that difficult, the workers who still report have masks. And asking the claimants to wear a mask will be a little more difficult but necessary and they will do it. My concern is if claimants need prolonged contact such as an application. Is that going to be done in person or will phone contact be required?
This provision has been in place since we closed office to the public. As for who will man the offices - managers ....who keep things going. We have no centralized print o managers across the country are stuffing envelopes, scanning every piece of mail into “work track” so employees at home can work item. No PPE has been provided by -SSA...no gloves, no masks. So we have been doing the interviews with the public...potentially been exposed daily in some cases. Also we keep stacking leave Bc if we don’t go in - the wheels stop moving
Doesn't surprise me at their approach. I sat in countless management meetings where everyone patted each other on the back for
innovative ideas but when a crisis hits then it's headless chickens running around. I spent hours faxing paperwork into worktrack. If it's true then PPEs should have been provided immediately.
100 true. When this hit we were told our area office had one box of gloves for nearly 30 offices. To date the only ppe purchased have been mask for when employees return. I’ve supplied myself and management team with gloves and masks. Even better offices had n95 masks from the 2009 flu - we were told to donate them.
Sounds like an investment in more PPE is needed. I'd add that given the record-setting rates of spread seen throughout large swaths of the country, combined with what we now know about airborne transmission through suspended respiratory droplets (meaning its not enough to simply avoid being coughed on or sneezed on), offices should continue with this policy of providing only "very limited" in-person services for the foreseeable future.
Hopefully Saul avoids the pressure from certain members of Congress to use federal employees as an "example" by sending them back to work, despite the obvious safety risk, in a misguided attempt to encourage the masses to "just go back to work already" despite having no job to return to.
Has anyone heard if in-person when in-person hearings are coming back? I am scheduling September and presuming they will still be phone hearings.
I stockpiled like crazy before I left. I even ordered for the guards because their company was lax in ordering them. I was told the amounts were questionable. Only office I had an issue with. Then again the DM was an interesting person.
7:46 speaks the truth. Managers at both FO's and OHO's have been going in for months to process manual work like mail, faxes and UPS shipments. FO's are meeting with people in person by appointment whom they deem as Dire Need.
PPE in my office was outdated when we left in March and early on was nearly impossible to find. Kudos to those offering guards PPE, however, when we shut, there was no mandate for the guards to use it.
@8:11, word on the street is phone hearings thru the end of November but nothing official, yet. These will be interesting times going thru the end of the calendar year for sure.
I have read through the comments. This is where the value of dealing with the Union comes in. We are not some sort of adversary looking to get one up on managers. The Union was asking for the provision of PPE in March while it was still available, and regional/area officials instead made ridiculous rules regarding it’s use, such as having employees sign disclaimers and not allowing use of office stocks of PPE where it was available. One region submitted a bargaining demand April 17th and to date that regional commissioner refuses to respond to that request, even though it covers a laundry list of concerns that all of you apparently share. The best way to let the Union help you and your staffs maneuver this situation is to make the demand of Jim Julian and other SSA leadership in Baltimore to start sitting down and having meaningful conversations and planning with the Union. The time for “we’ll take back your concerns” and “briefings” needs to come to an end.
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