Fee Payments | ||
|---|---|---|
| Month/Year | Volume | Amount |
Jan-10 | 32,227 | $111,440,046.23 |
Feb-10 | 29,914 | $105,708,101.59 |
Mar-10 | 34,983 | $122,874,426.87 |
So far this calendar year,weekly visits to SSA’s field offices have hit the one million mark five times, while in all of last year, visits hit the one-million mark only twice. The Government Accountability Office and others have concluded that resource shortages over the years have contributed to the development of unprecedented backlogs in disability hearings, and caused reduced staffing throughout the agency even as workloads have risen. By the end of 2007, agency staffing had dropped to almost the level in 1972 – before the start of the SSI program – even though SSA’s beneficiary population had nearly doubled since that time. This in turn has led to a decline in customer service and a buildup of unprocessed workloads in SSA local field offices.
In FY 2008 through FY 2010, Congress provided SSA with increased funding to begin to address the backlogs and other service delivery declines. These increased resources reflect Congressional concerns about the unacceptable backlog in disability claim processing, but have not been sufficient to address the growing amount of work that SSA has been forced to defer in order to process the increasing number of new claims on a timely basis.
Despite the hard work and dedication of SSA employees in field offices and teleservice centers, SSA’s level of service to the public has deteriorated. Field office managers report that they do not have sufficient staff to answer the phones, assist walk-in visitors, and produce the high-quality work the public deserves. In FY 2009, 58 percent of callers who tried to reach an SSA field office got a busy signal, up from 51 percent in FY 2008. As a result, more walk-in visits occur for matters that could be handled by phone. Field office managers and front-line staff also are increasingly concerned about declining quality in the work they produce. Nearly all resources are needed to process claims and assist SSA’s customers, and little is left to perform traditional quality-control and staff-training activities. ...
In announcing the hearing, Chairman Earl Pomeroy (D-ND) stated “the Social Security Administration (SSA) was right to prioritize reducing the disability claims backlog, but I am concerned that other services that SSA provides to the American people are not getting sufficient attention and resources. I am interested in knowing what steps SSA is taking to address these other growing and backlogged workloads, and how the Subcommittee can be instrumental in making sure that SSA is once again able to provide the top-notch customer service the public deserves.”
Come 2018, even Social Security's staunchest defenders will have no choice but to admit that the program faces an urgent crisis.
That's when Social Security's Disability Insurance Trust Fund is due to run out, resulting in benefit cuts for disabled workers and their families.
And those cuts would be sharp — roughly 8% in 2018 and 16% in 2019 relative to scheduled levels. ...
[E]ven if the OASI [Old Age and Survivors Insurance] trust fund is still officially flush, it won't be able to automatically shift its Treasury-issued debt to the disability program.
For more on this, see a Government Executive article.Ohio residents seeking Social Security Disability Insurance wait longer for a hearing than residents of any other state, says a study released Tuesday, April 6.More than 19 months on average pass before disability claims are heard by administrative law judges who determine eligibility for benefits, said Allsup, an Illinois company that processes Social Security disability claims.
