From Mark Miller's syndicated column:
If you need help filing for Social Security, Medicare or disability benefits, I have good news and bad news.The good news: The sprawling network of more than 1,200 Social Security field offices around the United States will reopen to the public in early April after a two-year COVID-19 shutdown ...
The bad news: The Social Security Administration (SSA) is bracing for a crush of office visitors. Along with the pent-up demand created by the long shutdown, the agency’s national toll-free number has been experiencing problems, with some callers getting busy signals or abrupt disconnections, which an SSA spokesman confirmed. The phone system problems are expected to increase demand further in the initial weeks of the reopening.
The return to office comes at a time when the SSA was working to replace staff lost during the pandemic. But hiring has been frozen due to a lower-than-expected operating budget signed into law last week as part of a $1.5 trillion U.S. government spending bill for 2022. The SSA budget rose by $411 million to a total of $13.3 billion – less than half of what the Biden administration had requested.
“Our 2022 funding level will complicate our efforts to improve services to the public, although we remain committed to doing so,” said Mark Hinkle, the agency’s press officer, via email. ...
Part of the problem is application processing delays at the state level. The SSA sends disability applications to state agencies, which make medical determinations of eligibility. The largest backlog is in Florida, which had 92,525 cases awaiting determination at the end of January; Texas, California, New York state and Georgia also had large backlogs, according to agency data.
The SSA funds these state-level determinations, so the agency’s broader budget crunch has played a role in the backlogs, according to Cloyd [who works for NOSSCR]. ...
Wont SSA be okay because everyone is retiring or moving to other jobs because they have to come back to the offices? Wont this lower the payrates because the new hires wont be making as much? I mean for two years all we have heard is that the entire agency is walking off if they have to come to an office.
ReplyDeleteThere has been a bit of a brain drain in the past two years. Many have been replaced by poorly trained employees. The simple things will still be processed correctly. But lookout if the claim is at all complicated.
Deletebesides a few bloggers nobody cares, the public fumes and nobody cares. The public takes out the anger on the employees of SSA as though they created this mess.
ReplyDeleteNobody holds congress and the white house accountable. If congress experienced the anger SSA employees face, things would change quickly.
ReplyDeleteI'm an SSA employee and I planned to retire as soon as I was called back to the office. However, upon learning I will only have to go in one day per week, I decided to stay a while longer.
I will retire as soon as they tell us we have to come in more often.
I suspect this is why SSA is giving employees so much telework when the offices reopen: to avoid a retirement and quitting wave.
I knew we should have started a pool.
ReplyDelete