The National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) is reporting that there will soon be an increase in the cap on the amount that attorneys may charge under the fee agreement process and that henceforth the cap will be adjusted annually for inflation.
13 comments:
Sounds reasonable to index it to inflation. The user fee should also be indexed to inflation.
Because of the actual nonexist cost that the federal government incurred electronically depositing money? Explain the inflation on that.
Nonsensical to twin indexing of fees w/the user fee w/no semblance of a practical reason to do so.
It is not just the deposit. It is the processing of appointment forms by fax. And the processing of duplicate forms received by fax. And duplicates of the duplicates faxed again days later. And the invalid forms. And the chasing down claimants to verify electronic signature. And the fee petitions. And the manual payment to multiple reps from the same firm. And the manual notices.
Because labor costs increase yearly of the people paying your fee.
The user fee has been indexed from the beginning. It was capped at $75.00 originally and is currently $113.00.
And yes, there are other costs associated with processing attorney fees but in the litany of costs, note that the repeated faxing of information is only needed because status of cases is still limited online and getting someone to answer the phone on a consistent basis does not happen at the DO and at the payment centers aside from PSC 7 does not exist at all.
The user fee IS indexed to the COLA: https://secure.ssa.gov/poms.nsf/lnx/0203920019
“…adjusting the flat-rate cap based on annual cost-of-living adjustments rounded down to the next lower $1 beginning December 1, 2006”
That’s a social security policy problem. There is actually no need to verify electronic signatures. If the administration believes a lawyer is lying and submitting false information, that’s the actual problem and there is a method to deal with that. Requiring attestation is just another wait to make clients wait so they give up. The multiple fees to attorneys is another SSA problem. That issue shouldn’t exist either. But none of this costs more when the fee is higher. That’s nonsensical.
People who work for the government gets raises on a predetermjned schedule.
Repeated faxing is needed? Regularly, reps fax a 1696 and fee agreement (some even do the 1695 still). Then follow that with certified mail of the same. Then with EVERY status request (and they are legion) they send them. Then they file an appeal and send them. And it just continues until the final decision. And an SSA employee must scan and profile each one. An SSA employee must review each duplicate to see if there’s been a material change (maybe the EIN changed or the principle rep changed). But sure, have us believe you must send a 1696 with every correspondence because it’s hard to get through to us on the phone.
Hopefully, the amount the ALJ's can approve at the local level for fee petitions will also be increased and adjusted regularly for inflation.
@ 9:08 AM, March 30, 2024 People who work for the government gets raises on a predetermjned schedule. SSA is hiring, especially in certain components including the new Office of Transformation. The fact that government employees get a cost of living allowance is great. Sometimes it's large sometimes it's small - or some years, nothing. This year, it's the only thing we will get and everyone gets the same amount. No awards, no performance-based recognition whatsoever for those of us trying to keep the wheels motivated by our teams, or the mission, or some other intrinsic driver. So, for those of us putting in 12-14 or more hours a day, it's not nearly enough to deal with this complete chaos. You're welcome to my job, though it requires complete sentences and accurate spelling.
The issues of multiple paperwork being submitted is largely due to the inefficient procedures the agency requires. We do complete the electronic application and fax and certify mail applications. Why do we do this? Because if we don't when we call to check the status we are told the documents were neve received. It is amazing how quickly they are found when you tell them you have a green card with the signature and date. This has happened dozens, maybe hundreds of times. The agency needs to make the process more efficient. We get different answers from different offices on how things should be submitted. I sent an email a few months ago to a regional office asking about the best and most efficient way to submit applications (believe it or not, we don't like the extra work of submitting things multiple ways either or the expense of certified mail). My email was acknowledged and I was told I could expect a response. That was at least six months ago and no response. I know why there has been no response. Each local office just does its own thing so you cannot tell someone the best overall way to submit things. The VA had a centralized intake. That seems to work well. SSA could probably go to regional intake centers. It would be more efficient to have a person processing 1696's all day rather than a local office person who is doing a dozen different things. Of course, that might result in some job losses in local offices and each office is in some congressman's district. So, don't blame the reps who are just trying to make sure their client's paperwork gets processed. If we do not do electronic apps, fax and certify mail applications, many will likely not get processed. We would not be doing a very good job for our clients then, would we? The agency needs to come up with a better way and stop scapegoating others for its failings.
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