E-Pulling Has E-Failed -- And An Attempt At An Explanation Why Such A Foolish Idea Ever Got Tried

From a recent report by Social Security's Office of Inspector General (OIG) (emphasis added):

Our objectives were to (1) assess the results of the Social Security Administration's (SSA) Electronic File Assembly (ePulling) pilot project and (2) determine whether the assessment procedures were effective in deciding when the Office of Disability Adjudication and Review's (ODAR) hearing offices were ready to implement ePulling. ...

ODAR expects ePulling to increase the efficiency of the EF preparation process and reduce the time it takes to prepare a case for hearing. ODAR estimates that ePulling may result in an annual reduction of 402 work-years and a savings of $16.6 million. ...

From June through December 2008, ePulling was used to prepare the files for 773 cases. ...

The 773 cases prepared using ePulling contained 250,938 pages. For each page, ODAR assessed the ePulling software's accuracy in identifying four categories of information: type of document, document's source, document's beginning date, and document's ending date. ODAR found that multiple corrections were required for the pages processed. In fact, 433,790 corrections were required for the 250,938 pages processed. ...

Since June 2008, the contractor has made five enhancements to the ePulling software. To determine whether the enhancements improved the accuracy of the software, ODAR processed the same 10 cases through each ePulling software enhancement. In addition to the 10 cases repeatedly tested, ODAR selected 5 to 10 new cases to test each enhancement. ... As shown in Table 2, following the January 2009 enhancement, the accuracy rates computed from this limited number of cases in the areas of type of document (65 percent) and source of document (75 percent) show accuracy rates comparable to the rates ODAR calculated for the 773 cases (see Table 1). In the area of dates of document (64 percent), the accuracy rates were slightly better for the 15 to 20 cases as compared to the accuracy rates reported for the 773 cases, which was in the 40-percent range. However, accuracy rates declined between June 2008 and January 2009. ...

We interviewed six employees in the Tupelo, Mississippi, Hearing Office and three employees in the Minneapolis, Minnesota, Hearing Office who prepared cases using ePulling. All nine employees stated that ePulling increased case preparation time when compared to the traditional EF preparation process. ...

We recommend that SSA:

1. Perform a complete assessment of the ePulling pilot project results before expanding the use of ePulling to other hearing offices. The assessment should ensure that ePulling will not adversely affect file preparation time or any other aspect of the hearings process.

2. Consider if historical data can corroborate or improve upon the current 3-hour case preparation time estimate used to assess ePulling's impact on hearing office productivity.

3. Determine whether the ePulling pilot testing should also include cases with more than 300 pages. ...

SSA agreed with our recommendations.

Regular readers may recall that I have been extremely skeptical about e-pulling. I wish I could claim great prescience, but I cannot. I think that almost everyone familiar with pulling exhibits knew from the beginning that e-pulling could not work.

Lisa DeSoto appears to be the person most directly responsible for the e-pulling experiment. She is now gone from Social Security. We may never know whether e-pulling had anything to do with her departure. However, I do not want to blame Ms. DeSoto too much. The underlying problem is that Social Security was being given grossly inadequate resources to perform its mission. Social Security management knew that things were falling apart, but they were under enormous pressure to manage their way out of the problem. They resorted to a variety of "Hail Mary passes" such as e-pulling. All or virtually all of these "Hail Mary passes" failed, wasting money and staff time. These "Hail Mary passes" also misled Congress about the resources the agency needed to get its work done. Why give Social Security more money and personnel when Social Security managers are promising that "Hail Mary passes" are going to save the day? But, of course, Social Security managers were only telling Congress what it wanted to hear.

The real problem was that the Republican controlled Congresses between 1994 and 2006 were just irresponsible. They underfunded Social Security to the point that its managers tried desperate measures. I am sure that the Democratic controlled Congresses since 2006 have made and will continue to make mistakes, but they are not starving Social Security to the point that its managers repeatedly try "Hail Mary passes." Even a Republican like Michael Astrue should be able to appreciate that.

$215,000 Fraud

The Pittsburg Tribune-Review is reporting on a $215,000 Social Security fraud that extended over 14 years. That is the biggest one that I can recall hearing of, at least by one individual.

Employment At Social Security Dipped

Below are the March 2009 figures for the number of employees at Social Security, recently released by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), along with earlier figures for comparison purposes. The agency was operating on a continuing funding resolution for most of that time between September 2008 and March 2009 which probably accounts for the slight dip in the number of employees. The next report should show a significant increase in the number of employees at Social Security.

• March 2009 63,229
  
• December 2008 63,733
  
• September 2008 63,990
  
• June 2008 63,622
  
• March 2008 60,465
  
• December 2007 61,822
• September 2007 62,407
• June 2007 62,530
• March 2007 61,867
• December 2006 63,410
• September 2006 63,647
• September 2005 66,147
• September 2004 65,258
• September 2003 64,903
• September 2002 64,648
• September 2001 65,377
• September 2000 64,521
• September 1999 63,957
• September 1998 65,629

What?

From a recent transmittal of Social Security's HALLEX Manual:

If the representative or claimant does not file a fee agreement before SSA makes a favorable decision on a claim with which the representative is involved, yet files a fee agreement before SSA makes another favorable decision in that claim, the decision maker will disapprove the fee agreement for the following reason:

The Social Security Administration did not receive the written agreement before making the first favorable decision that the representative worked toward achieving in this claim.

And what is the legal basis for this? Maybe there is some explanation that escapes me but this sounds like someone is trying to create a problem where none existed previously.

Union Newsletter

Most Social Security employees are members of Council 220 of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), a labor union. Council 220 has released the June 2009 edition of the National Council Digest, one of its two newsletters. I have never been able to figure out why they need two newsletters.

Federal Employee Salaries

You can now search a database to see what any federal employee made in 2008. I am told that this site is getting such heavy use that there may be delays in getting data.

Not Proving What You Think

From a press release issued by Allsup:

The average time to process initial Social Security disability claims is increasing by 20 percent this year ... according to Allsup, which represents tens of thousands of people in the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) application and hearing process each year. ...

"Those who apply for benefits with Allsup's expert assistance may be more likely to bypass the long wait and get their SSDI benefits even earlier," Mr. Stein said. "Typically, 54 percent of those who use Allsup will be approved at the application level, but only 35 percent will be approved if they go it alone." ...

About 70 percent of Allsup customers do not have to attend a hearing because Allsup requests an on-the-record decision and presents the judge with a well-developed claim file prior to a hearing.

Actually, what this shows is that Allsup only takes on what it thinks are gold-plated, cannot lose cases. If you take on only this type of case, it does not matter quite as much that the person representing the claimant meets the claimant for the first time on the day of the hearing.

New Office In Tanner's District

NWTN Today (Northwestern Tennessee?) reports that John Tanner, the Chairman of the House Social Security Subcommittee, was on hand Tuesday for the opening of a new Social Security field office in Union City, a town in his district. Social Security's Commissioner Michael Astrue and Regional Commissioner Paul Barnes were also on hand. Here is an interesting excerpt from the Commissioner's remarks:

... “I get dozens of pieces of mail from the public every day thanking me for the work that some particular person has done and helped them through some problem,” Astrue said. “And that compassion that you show on a regular basis is such an important part of our mission.” He added that he sees the “difficult” things, too, such as violence reports each and every day. Three years ago, SSA was receiving three to five threats a day. But with the downturn of the economy, “and as the fabric of the country has been torn,” threats have increased to 10 a day.

I wonder how many field office opening ceremonies the Commissioner attends.