Background

SSA offers a range of services, which includes providing financial  assistance to eligible individuals through the following three major benefit  programs:    Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI)—provides benefits to retired  workers and their families and to survivors of deceased workers.
Disability Insurance (Disability)—provides benefits to eligible workers  who have qualifying disabilities, and their eligible family members.
Supplemental Security Income (SSI)—provides income for aged, blind,  or disabled individuals with limited income and resources.
In fiscal year 2008, these three benefit programs provided a combined total  of approximately $650 billion to nearly 55 million beneficiaries. SSA  projects that the benefit payments and number of beneficiaries for the  three programs will increase in fiscal year 2009 (see tables 1 and 2).
Besides paying benefits through these three programs, SSA issues Social  Security cards, maintains earnings records, and performs various other  functions through a network of field office and headquarters operations using  an administrative budget of over $10 billion. SSA’s field operations consist of:  field offices, which serve as the agency’s primary points for face-to-face  contact;    Social Security Card Centers, which issue Social Security numbers;    Teleservice Centers, which offer national, toll-free telephone service;    Program Service Centers, which make entitlement decisions for  benefits, as well as assist in answering 800-number calls.
Table 3 shows the type of work that is performed by various SSA field  components.
Field offices are located in communities across the United States, the  Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and Guam, delivering services through face-to- face contact, over the phone, and through the mail. Field offices range in  size from large urban offices with 50 or more employees to very small  offices in remote areas called resident stations. In September 2008, there  were 1,267 field offices and 30 resident stations. Resident stations have  more limited services, and are staffed by one or two individuals. Field  offices also offer services to the public through 734 contact stations, as of  September 2008. These stations provide very limited functions and are  staffed with one SSA field office employee who travels to certain  locations, such as a hospital, once a month. Additionally, SSA has begun  using video conferencing to take claims and provide other services to  customers in remote locations in North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana,  Minnesota, Utah, Alaska, and Wyoming. SSA is planning to expand the  video network to provide additional sites and services.
In addition to field offices, SSA offers customers a variety of other options  for conducting their business. Individuals may call SSA’s toll-free helpline  to file for benefits or to obtain general information. They also may use the  Internet to file for benefits, or visit a Social Security Card Center to  request a Social Security card. Figure 1 shows the various options by  which customers may conduct their business with SSA.
While SSA field offices take applications and determine if claimants meet  basic, nonmedical eligibility requirements for benefits, state Disability  Determination Services (DDS) that are under contract with SSA make  medical eligibility determinations for Disability and SSI claims. SSA’s  Hearing Offices and Appeals Council make decisions on appeals of these  determinations. Appendix III describes the functions of each of these  entities in the medical disability determination process for Disability and  SSI claims. DDSs also conduct continuing disability reviews for Disability  and SSI beneficiaries to ensure that individuals are still medically eligible  for payments.

	Reduced Field Office Staffing May Have Adversely Affected Field Office Operations

Overall, the number of field office staff and the amount of work completed  declined from fiscal year 2005 through 2008. Specifically, both staffing  levels and work completed decreased from 2005 through 2007 and  increased slightly in 2008. However, field office employees completed  more work, on average, as a result of greater efficiency. If not for the  increased productivity of SSA, the decline in work completed could have  been greater. Nonetheless, staffing declines resulted in customers waiting  longer to be served and difficulties for field offices in answering calls from  customers. SSA and its field offices used various strategies to manage  work demands, such as deferring certain work, sharing work among  offices, and redirecting staff to serve critical needs outside of their usual  responsibilities. Despite these efforts, field office managers and staff  stated that they cannot keep up with their work. Further, these factors  may have contributed to a 3 percent drop in SSA’s customer satisfaction  rating between fiscal years 2005 and 2008. While SSA has measures to  monitor field office waiting times and, to a certain extent, customer  service, SSA has no quantitative field office standards for how long  customers should wait and if the phone should be answered. According to  SSA, field offices have greatly varying circumstances with visitors and  phone service and standards in these areas have not been established.  Instead, SSA has a variety of field office measures for processing work.

		Increased Staff Productivity Helped Soften the Impact of Staffing Decline

Despite a 4.4 percent staffing decline from fiscal years 2005 through 2008,  the amount of work that field offices produced decreased by only 1.3  percent. As a result, the average amount of work produced by field office  employees increased by 2.9 percent between fiscal years 2005 and 2008  (see table 4). One reason for this greater efficiency is that SSA is shifting  work from busy field offices to less busy offices; SSA cites other reasons,  including automation efforts and simplification of programs and policies.  The field office staffing reduction comprised 65 percent of SSA’s overall  reduction.
SSA officials attributed the staffing reductions to inadequate  appropriations. Table 5 shows the Commissioner’s and the President’s  budget requests and SSA’s final appropriations (as available) for fiscal  years 2002 through 2009. The table also shows the changes in recent  staffing levels. The table does note that SSA received a $500 million budget  increase in 2005 to manage the implementation of the Medicare  prescription drug program and hire associated staff. In addition, other  work that SSA conducts on behalf of other federal agencies has grown.
For example, new state laws requiring federal government verification of  work authorization are resulting in additional work and field office visits  associated with the Department of Homeland Security’s E-Verify program.
Despite the staffing reductions, field offices are serving a growing volume  of visitors. Comparing fiscal years 2006 and 2008, visitor volume increased  by about 2.5 million customers, from 41.9 million to 44.4 million. As figure  2 shows, from fiscal years 2005 through 2008, SSA processed more  postentitlement work (other than for continuing eligibility reviews),  enumeration work, and Medicare work. SSA processed less work for  OASI, Disability, and SSI claims (nonmedical determinations only);  Continuing Disability Reviews; and SSI Redeterminations. SSA attributes  the high volume of postentitlement actions to the growth in beneficiary  populations.

		SSA Deferred Certain Field Office Work, and Used Other Strategies to Manage Staffing Declines

SSA is shifting work among field offices, based on their workloads, in an  effort to increase overall efficiency. If a field office has work demands that  it cannot immediately cover, that office can request that some work be  transferred to another office. Offices that have a particular expertise in a  certain type of work make themselves available, as they can process this  work more quickly. Field managers told us, however, that sometimes they  are reluctant to share work because the office that receives and processes  the work receives numerical credit, which helps an office justify a greater  staff level for the future.
Managers also are using claims processing personnel to perform the duties  typically conducted by lower-graded employees, and in some cases, even  office managers take on duties of their employees. Such duties include  answering the telephone, providing initial services to arriving customers,  processing requests for new or replacement Social Security cards, and  conducting some administrative duties. While all field office personnel  recognize the need to serve visitors, many also told us that such work is  taking away from time spent processing claims and managing the office.
While SSA is encouraging customers to use automated services to help  field offices accomplish their work, many field staff said that real gains in  automated services will likely be achieved by future generations of  customers. SSA’s vision for its “eService” program is that the public,  businesses, and government agencies will be able to conduct all business  through secure, electronic channels—thereby increasing the efficiency  with which the agency can serve the public. SSA reported that in fiscal  years 2007 and 2008, respectively, the public performed 2.9 million and 3.7  million electronic transactions. Among SSA’s electronic services are  applying for retirement and disability benefits, requesting a change of  address, arranging direct deposit of benefit amounts, and requesting a  Medicare replacement card. SSA’s electronic services are available to the  public over the Internet and some are also available by telephone, using  the voice recognition capabilities of SSA’s toll-free number. While field  office staff and managers welcome automated tools that the public can  use, some added that relatively few customers use them, and that due to  erroneous or missing information in online forms, field staff can lose time  having to contact the customers for clarification or more information.
Finally, with fewer staff available, SSA focused on field office work it  considered essential to its “core workloads,” such as processing new  claims for Social Security benefits and issuing Social Security cards, but  deferred other types of work. Field office managers and staff told us that  with the emphasis on completing core workloads, certain postentitlement  actions typically are delayed or deferred when an office is under stress,  including changes of address, changes to direct deposit information, and  reviews to determine beneficiaries’ continuing eligibility for disability and  SSI benefits.
Reviews of continuing eligibility, however, are key activities in ensuring  payment accuracy. Such reviews yield a lifetime savings for both Disability  and SSI of $10 for every dollar invested, according to SSA. In recent years,  SSA has reduced the number of reviews conducted, citing budget  limitations and an increase in core work (see fig. 3). When reviews of  benefits are delayed, some beneficiaries are allowed to continue receiving  benefits when they no longer qualify.
Despite SSA’s efforts to manage work with reduced staff, many managers  responding to a survey conducted in February and March 2007 by the  National Council of Social Security Management Associations (NCSSMA)  stated that they are finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the  work. On average, the managers responding to the survey estimated that  they would need a staffing increase of 16.7 percent to provide adequate  public service.

		Staffing Reductions May Have Contributed to a Buildup of Certain Work, Longer Waiting Times, and More Unanswered Calls

Reduced staffing and increases in visitors may have contributed to a  buildup of work in field offices and longer customer wait times over the  past few years. According to an SSA official, staffing shortfalls resulted in  a buildup of 1,000 work years, for work that SSA was not able to complete  at the end of fiscal year 2007. SSA projects that the buildup will grow to  5,800 work years by the end of fiscal year 2009; however, officials said that  they are re-evaluating this figure in light of increases in productivity and  overtime. Staffing reductions also may have led to longer customer waiting  times. From fiscal year 2002 through 2006, the average waiting time to first  contact for all customers increased by 40 percent from 15 to 21 minutes  (see fig. 4).
SSA has not established standards for how long customers should wait to be  served and waiting times vary considerably among offices. In fiscal year 2008,  8 percent of customers nationwide—more than 3 million people—waited  more than an hour, which included approximately 405,000 customers who  waited more than 2 hours for service (see table 6). In both fiscal years 2007  and 2008, customers with appointments waited significantly less time than  those without appointments. For example, for fiscal year 2007, SSA reported  that 1,214 offices had average waiting times of less than 10 minutes for  customers with appointments, while only 2 had average waiting times of more  than an hour. We also found significant variability in waiting times among  field offices for customers without appointments. For customers without  appointments, more than 300 offices had average waiting times of less than 10  minutes, while 23 offices had average waiting times that exceeded 1 hour in  fiscal year 2007. Further, customers without appointments during fiscal year  2007 waited more than an hour on average at 4 of the offices we visited. In  contrast, customers at the office in Devils Lake, North Dakota, waited on  average for less than 1 minute (see app. II, table 9).
Further, some field office managers and staff in the offices we visited told  us that many customers report they waited for over an hour before  meeting with SSA representatives. In 17 of the 21 field offices visited,  managers and staff told us that long waiting times were among the top  customer complaints. In addition, 82 percent of the managers responding  to the February and March 2007 NCSSMA survey reported that waiting  times in their offices were longer than they had been in the prior 2 years;  in the 2005 survey, 72 percent of the managers reported that their staffing  was not sufficient to maintain reasonable waiting times.
Insufficient staffing also may have been a factor in poor office phone  service. SSA’s 2006 Field Office Caller Survey found that 51 percent of  customers that called 48 randomly selected field offices had one or more  earlier calls that had gone unanswered. Because SSA based its results  only on customers who were ultimately able to get through to the field  offices, the actual percentage of customers that had unanswered calls was  likely even higher. In addition, staff at 13 of the 21 offices we visited  characterized their phone service as inadequate, while staff in 2 of these  offices reported that they did not answer their offices’ phones at all.  Employees we interviewed also cited inadequate telephone service as a  common customer complaint at 15 offices. SSA has undertaken efforts to  improve service in this area. For example, in 2007, SSA officials told us  they initiated a pilot program called “Forward on Busy” in 25 field offices  to address these deficiencies. Under the pilot, calls receiving a busy signal  at field offices are automatically forwarded to a Teleservice Center. SSA  has since expanded the pilot to approximately 200 field offices.
SSA has not established standards for customer waiting times or telephone  service. Without such standards, SSA is less able to target its scarce  resources to improve customer service. To enable agencies to identify  areas in need of improvement, GAO internal control standards state that  agencies should establish standards and monitor performance. Further,  while SSA conducts national surveys of customer satisfaction and  provides field offices with customer comment cards, at 10 of the 21 offices  we visited, officials told us they did not use them, and where the cards  were available, the results were not always systematically tabulated.
Staff at some of the offices we visited indicated that they now have less  time to spend with customers, potentially leading to mistakes and also  limiting the ability of staff to ensure that customers fully understand their  options and benefits. These factors may have contributed to a 3 percent  drop in SSA’s overall customer satisfaction rating from 84 percent in fiscal  year 2005 to 81 percent in fiscal year 2008. Work demands and staffing  reductions have increased the pressure placed on the field office staff,  resulting in higher stress and lower morale, according to field office staff.  We asked 153 SSA employees at the 21 offices we visited to rate the stress  they experienced in attempting to complete their work in a timely manner,  and 65 percent reported feeling stress to a “great” or “very great” extent on  a daily basis. The stress of expanding workloads and staffing constraints  was felt most acutely by the office managers, with 74 percent of managers  describing high levels of stress. At many offices, staff indicated that  mounting workload pressures have led to cutbacks in the amount of time  allocated for training and mentoring new staff, and SSA has reduced the  number of continuing disability reviews (medical) and SSI  redeterminations that it conducts to ensure that disability beneficiaries are  paid the correct amounts. Further, managers and staff told us that they  often do not have time to take their breaks, including lunch. Some staff  told us that they feel they are letting down their colleagues and feel guilty  about taking time off, regardless of whether they use credit hours or  annual leave. While these responses may not be indicative of the opinions  of the overall field office workforce, they do suggest that increasing  demands placed on SSA staff may be diminishing their job satisfaction,  potentially with long-term implications for employee retention. SSA  officials acknowledged that growing workloads have seriously  compromised agency morale, and they have tried to ease the stress on  staff by authorizing the use of overtime. The officials also noted that, over  time, the automated tools should reduce the burden on staff, as customers  that use the tools will not have to visit a field office.

	Growth in Work Demands and an Employee Retirement Wave May Pose Difficult Challenges without a Detailed Plan for Service Delivery

Projected increases to SSA’s workload from retirement and disability  filings by the nation’s approximately 80 million baby boomers and a wave  of employee retirements may pose serious management challenges.  Further, SSA has no detailed plan to ensure quality service is provided to  the public in an environment characterized by growing work demands and  limited resources.

		Projected Growth in Work Demands and Employee Retirement Wave Will Pose Challenges for SSA

SSA estimates a 13 percent rise in OASI, Disability, and SSI claims over the  next 10 years, rising from a combined total of 9.4 million, in fiscal year  2008, to 10.7 million in fiscal year 2017 (see fig. 5). SSA projected that its  claims receipts would increase at a faster pace between fiscal years 2007  through 2010 than they did in fiscal years 2005 and 2006.
SSA projects a growth of 22 percent in the number of beneficiaries, from  about 49.6 million in calendar year 2007 to about 60.5 million in calendar  year 2015 (see fig. 6). By 2050, there will be an estimated total of 95.6  million OASI and Disability beneficiaries.
SSA’s ability to meet its growing workload challenges will be more difficult as  a result of the anticipated retirement of many of the agency’s most  experienced field office workers. Today, about 20 percent of all SSA  employees are eligible for regular retirement, and that figure will grow to 39  percent in the next 5 years. Based on the agency’s projections, 44 percent of  SSA’s current workforce will retire by 2016. The peak of these retirements  began in 2007 and is expected to continue into 2009, and then start to decline  gradually (see fig. 7). SSA’s projections suggest that the ranks of SSA’s  supervisors will be hit hard, with 71 percent eligible to retire in the next 10  years. These will be the agency’s most experienced staff, which will mean a  loss of decades of institutional knowledge. During fiscal years 2007 and 2008,  respectively, SSA lost 3,074 and 2,605 staff to retirements. Field office  managers and staff at many of the locations we visited stated that it typically  takes 2 to 3 years for new employees to become fully proficient. Also, new  hires would benefit from mentoring by veteran employees before the latter  retire. Using the approximately $150 million that SSA was appropriated above  the President’s fiscal year 2008 budget request, SSA planned to hire an  additional 3,900 staff for operations, including 2,350 new hires for regional  and field office operations. Although SSA hired 2,479 staff for its field offices,  after transfers, retirements, and resignations, at the end of fiscal year 2008,  SSA had only 791 more staff in its field offices than it did at the end of fiscal  year 2007. As a result, the end of fiscal year 2008 SSA had 1,256 field staff  fewer than it did at the end of fiscal year 2005.
SSA has used a variety of strategies to maintain adequate staffing. SSA  offers recruitment, relocation, and retention bonuses to individuals with  needed skills and may consider employees’ prior nonfederal work  experience when computing annual leave. SSA also offers workplace  flexibilities to assist workers in balancing work and family. Additionally,  SSA uses dual compensation (salary offset) waivers from the Office of  Personnel Management (OPM) to respond to emergency conditions and  to hire for certain hard-to-fill positions. For example, SSA was granted a  waiver to re-employ federal annuitants who retired under an early-out  authority to provide relief in areas affected by Hurricanes Katrina and  Rita. Further, SSA has developed recruiting efforts that reach out to a  broader pool of candidates. For example, SSA began recruiting retired  military and disabled veterans in 2002 because of its commitment to  helping veterans.

		SSA’s Strategic Plan Is Ambitious, but It Is Not Clear How SSA Plans to Achieve Its Goals

SSA’s new strategic plan, published in September 2008, calls for SSA to  eliminate the backlog of disability hearings; improve the speed and quality  of the disability process; and improve retiree services—such as achieving  an online filing rate of 50 percent of retirement applications by 2012. This  plan also stresses the workload increases that SSA will face in the coming  years and recognizes SSA’s limited resources. However, this plan does not  explain what changes to field offices and what resources will be needed to  eliminate backlogs and improve services. While discussing the strategic  plan with us, SSA officials stated the strategic plan is not intended to be a  service delivery plan that details how the agency will address the service  needs of the retiring Baby Boom generation.
As early as 1993 and most recently in 2000, we recommended that SSA  develop a service delivery plan to help focus its efforts on meeting future  challenges. In 2000, we reported that SSA needed to better position itself  for the future by altering the agency’s network of facilities to more closely  align it with projected customer needs and demographics. Since 2000, SSA  has not developed a detailed plan for providing services to an expanding  population of customers brought on by the baby boom population  reaching retirement age. Instead, SSA officials told us that they use their  strategic plan to provide a broad vision and goals, and the annual budget  process to request resources for incremental changes. As this report and  SSA’s strategic plan show, SSA faces significant challenges in the future;  however, SSA remains without a plan that describes how it will continue  to do more work with fewer resources and achieve its new strategic goals.  It is not clear how SSA’s infrastructure, including the approximately 1,300  field offices with 27,000 field employees, can accommodate the growing  workload and field office visitor volume while ensuring quality customer  service. Further, while the plan includes strategies to significantly expand  the use of electronic services, it is not clear how the increase of online  services will mitigate the increasing workload.

	Conclusions

While SSA has taken action to manage its workload with fewer staff, the  broader challenge of providing nationwide field office service remains.  Although customers expect to be served in a reasonable amount of time  and have their phone calls answered, field offices are deferring certain  work, customers are waiting longer to be served, and staff feel stressed.  Projected increases in claims for benefits from the nation’s approximately  80 million baby boomers and a large retirement wave among SSA’s most  experienced staff will place even more pressure on field offices and could  make these problems more severe.
It is essential that SSA manage its increasing workload through strong  planning efforts. SSA’s strategic plan is a strong first step with its  acknowledgment of growing work demands and budget constraints.  Achieving the plan’s goal of an online filing rate of 50 percent of retirement  applications will surely relieve some service-demand growth at field  offices. However, it is not clear how SSA plans to accommodate the  growing workload and the goals of the strategic plan, while ensuring  quality customer service at field offices. SSA has been deferring work and  letting customer service decline. SSA’s new strategic plan indeed seeks to  address these problems, but it is not clear if SSA’s plan for greater reliance  on online retirement filings will, by itself, be sufficient. Whether SSA will  need more resources or an altered field office infrastructure, or both, is  unclear. A detailed service delivery plan should make this clear, and if  additional resources are needed to achieve agencywide goals, SSA should  identify the resources required to meet long-term service delivery needs.

	Recommendation for Executive Action

To pursue high-quality field office service, we recommend that SSA develop a  service delivery plan that describes, in detail, how it will deliver quality  customer service in the future while managing growing work demands with  constrained resources. This plan should identify the extent that new business  processes will allow SSA to accommodate growing demand or whether  additional resources are needed to achieve its strategic goals. Further, this  plan should establish standards for field office customer waiting times and  phone service to help identify and improve offices with poor service.

	Agency Comments and Our Evaluation

We obtained written comments on a draft of this report from the  Commissioner of Social Security, which are reproduced in appendix IV. In  addition, SSA provided technical comments, which we incorporated in the  report where appropriate.
In response to our draft report, SSA disagreed with our statement that they do  not have a detailed plan to address future service delivery needs. Rather, it  commented that it continually plans for the future and has been long aware  that the Baby Boom generation would have a dramatic impact on internal  staffing losses, as well as escalating disability and retirement claims  workloads. SSA described its current efforts as being the Annual Strategic  Plan and the agency’s annual budget documents. However, in response to  continuing concerns about a lack of a consolidated plan to address the  disability and retirement wave of the Baby Boom generation, SSA commented  that it is now developing a single document that describes the many planning  efforts that it has in place. SSA commented that its consolidated document  will, at minimum, include comprehensive plans for expanding electronic  services for customers; increasing the centralization of receiving phone calls  and working claims from customers while maintaining the network of local  field offices; enhancing phone and video services in field offices (where  applicable) and piloting self-service personal computers in the reception  areas of those offices; and continuing to assess the efficiency of field offices.
We welcome SSA’s decision to develop a consolidated planning document.  While SSA has a variety of planning efforts to improve its operations, it is still  not clear how SSA plans to minimize the deferral of its workloads and its  decline in customer service. The annual strategic plan is a strong vision for  the future, and annual budget documents detail short-term resource  requirements, but the budget documents do not identify resource  requirements for more than the next year and the strategic plan does not  identify resource requirements at all. It is not clear if SSA goals outlined in the  strategic plan can be achieved using the current infrastructure, and we  continue to recommend that SSA make clear to what extent additional  resources or an altered field office infrastructure might be needed to  accommodate the growth in disability and retirement filings.
SSA did not agree with our recommendation to establish quantitative  standards for field office customer wait times and phone service, stating  that such standards would create problems by diverting staff already  spread thin across field offices away from processing claims and  postentitlement work. SSA stated that it tracks waiting times and makes  adjustments as necessary to improve service, and that many of the  recently hired field office staff went to offices with the highest waiting  times. Still, over 3 million people waited over 1 hour for service last year  and in 2 offices the average wait was over 1 hour. The majority of phone  calls to field offices went unanswered, and the practice in some field  offices of not answering the phone and not returning voices messages is  unprofessional. While we understand that SSA field offices face many  pressures, we believe that clear standards that establish a minimum level  of quality customer service are an essential first step for organizations to  measure success. Absent customer service standards, long field office  waiting times and inadequate field office phone service are problems that  risk becoming entrenched.
In total, planning efforts should strive to establish that SSA’s infrastructure  is in the proper condition to manage its workload and provide quality  customer service. However, it is still not clear what infrastructure changes  and resources are needed for SSA to succeed.
As agreed with your offices, unless you publicly announce the contents of  this report earlier, we plan no further distribution until 30 days from the  report date. At that time, we will send copies to the Commissioner of  Social Security, appropriate congressional committees, and other  interested parties. In addition, the report will be available at no charge on  GAO’s Web site at http://www.gao.gov.
If you have any questions concerning this report, please contact me at  (202) 512-7215 or bovbjergb@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of  Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page  of this report. GAO staff who made key contributions to this report are  listed in appendix V.

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology

The objectives of our study were to determine (1) the effect that staffing  reductions have had on field office operations and (2) the challenges the  Social Security Administration (SSA) faces in meeting service delivery  needs in the future and the agency’s plans for addressing them. To assess  our first objective, we:  Interviewed SSA headquarters office operations. officials responsible for overseeing field    Compared the overall number of field office staffing per year from  fiscal years 2005 through 2008 to the amount of work produced overall  by the field offices for the same fiscal years to understand changes in  field office work productivity.
Condensed the 57 different types of work actions listed in the SSA’s  District Office Work Report into eight larger categories, and compared  the work volumes completed between fiscal years 2005 and 2008.
Determined the level of field office staffing using end of year staffing  data from SSA’s Justification for Appropriations Committees annual  documents as well as administrative data that SSA officials provided to  us for fiscal years 2002 through 2008.
Compared the national average wait time data from SSA’s Field Office  Waiting Time Study from fiscal year 2002 through 2006, and reported  data from SSA’s Visitor Intake Program (VIP) data for fiscal years 2007  and 2008.
Interviewed managers and staff in 21 field offices, 2 Social Security  Card Centers, 2 regional offices, and 3 area offices to gain their  perspectives on the effect of staffing reductions and strategies used to  manage work. We selected the field offices based on the populations  they served, their geographic location, number of staff, and customer  wait times (see app. II for a listing of the field offices we visited).
We tested the reliability of SSA’s work productivity and staffing data, and  found that they were sufficiently reliable for the purposes of our review.  Specifically, we obtained three relevant databases for fiscal years 2005  through 2008: (1) District Office Workload Report, (2) Work Unit Per Work  Year, and (3) staffing data. Each database contained critical data for  analysis of the workload handled by each SSA field office. SSA identified  these files as containing the supporting data for reports that SSA had  developed for internal uses. We tested the key variables in each file for  completeness and accuracy of the values coded in the records. To  determine the reliability of field office staffing data provided by SSA, we  compared the SSA data against staffing data from the U.S. Office of  Personnel Management’s (OPM) Central Personnel Data File. We  compared the number of staff per field office from OPM’s file with the  number of staff per field office provided by SSA. While there were isola differences for certain field offices, we found SSA’s field office staffing  data sufficiently reliable for the purpose of reporting field office staffing  data by region and nationally.
We e th  annual national average wait time for fiscal years 2002 to 2006, and  (2)  e th  national- and field-office-level wait time data from the VIP system that  A first implemented nationwide for fiscal year 2007. The fiscal year 2002  SS to  2006 data came from SSA’s Field Office Waiting Time Study that was  con .  represented the national average of wait times that field offices collected e sample of customer wait time at field offices was not large enough to  Th allo vel   vel reported directly to field office management instead of an  of the SSA organization smaller than the national average. SSA conducted  ty of two sources of customer wait time data: (1) ducted annually through the en d of fiscal year 2006. The data  w SSA to calculate statistically representative wait times for any le e ld office during a randomly selected 1-hour period each quarter of a  al year. SSA staff charged with implementing the sample at the field  th  study by having field employees sample customer wait times for each fie fisc office le independent entity within SSA. In a method such as this, it is important for ind yea noted that from fiscal year 2002 through 2006, the average wait time  were missing. We also found unexpected data entries; for instance, we orted by SSA increased from 15.2 to 21.0 minutes. We asked SSA  found wait times entered for weekend dates and negative wait times.   icials whether confidence intervals surrounding the wait time estimates   each fiscal year had been calculated. They informed us that they d Weid  rep off for not believe these calculations had been made. To assess if the increase in  wait times from fiscal year 2002 through 2006 was statistically significant,  we determined that we had to estimate the sampling error and create  confidence intervals surrounding the average wait times. The result was that for any year in the 2002 through 2006 period, the margin of error was s  no larger than 0.84. This allowed us to conclude that while difference between one individual year and the next were only sometimes  statistically significant, the difference between wait times for fiscal ye 2002 and 2006, respectively, was statistically significant. The difference of  than  5.35 minutes (based on GAO calculations) yielded a p-value of less  .0001. Statistical analysis of this kind assumes independence between  observations. However, we noted that this was not necessarily the ca ividual field offices to comply with the sampling regime. For the fiscal r 2002 through 2006 period, data for 14.9 percent of the sample hours  se. If,  for example, the first visit of the day took longer than scheduled, s ome  visitors arriving for later appointments with SSA staff on the same day  would presumably have to wait past their scheduled appointment time.
The VIP system has several uses, one of which is to produce average wait time data for each field office, as well as averages for each successive level  of SSA’s field structure (e.g., area, region, and national). The VIP system  replaced the Waiting Time Study at the start of fiscal year 2007. SSA now  electronically collects data on wait time that represent the full cohort of  SSA field office visitors (with few exceptions). However, there are no  built-in edits to capture input errors; rather, errors would have to be  identified by users of the data. We performed electronic testing of key da elements using all data for 21 field offices to which we had made a site  visit. After determining that SSA’s initial reports for GAO contained  incorrect calculations, we worked with SSA staff to replicate the wait time for selected groups of visitors; once completed, we determined that our  replicated database was comparable to the data that SSA had developed  on the basis of our joint work, and therefore we concluded that we could  use the VIP data as support for our conclusions and recommendations.
To address our second objective, we:  Interviewed SSA headquarters officials responsible for operations,  budget, and strategic and human capital planning, and obtained  relevant documentation.
Obtained data from SSA headquarters officials on the actual and  projected growth in the number of claims for fiscal years 2005 throug 2017.
Obtained the actual and projected number of Old-Age and Survivors  Insurance (OASI) and Disability Insurance (Disability) beneficiaries  between calendar years 2007 and 2050 from the 2008 Annual Report of  the Board of Trustees to identify the projected increase in the demand  for SSA services.
Obtained the actual and projected number of retirements of SSA staff  agency-wide from SSA’s “retirement wave” analyses for fiscal years  2007 through 2016 to assess future staffing needs.
Reviewed SSA’s past strategic plans and budget documents and  discussed the new strategic plan with SSA officials to determine SSA’s  plan for addressing future service delivery needs, and assessed the  adequacy of SSA’s internal controls in the context of customer service  policies.
In assessing the adequacy of SSA’s internal controls, we used the criteri in GAO’s Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government,  GAO/AIMD-00-21.3.1, dated November 1999. These standards, issued  pursuant to the requirements of the Federal Managers’ Financial Integrity  Act of 1982, provide the overall framework for establishing and  maintaining internal control in the federal government. Also pursuant to  the same Act, the Office of Management and Budget issued Circular A- 123, revised December 21, 2004, to provide the specific requirements for  assessing the reporting on internal controls. Internal control standards an the definition of internal control in Circular A-123 are based on GAO’s  Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government.
We conducted our work between July 2007 and January 2009 in  accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.  standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient,  appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and  conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe the evidence  obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions  based on our audit objectives.

Appendix II: Data on Beneficiaries, Staffing, Visitor Volume, and Wait Times in the 21 Offices GAO Visited

We used various data from SSA to select 21 field offices to visit. We  wanted a variety of offices in terms of geographic location, size of the  beneficiary population covered, the number of staff, the number of  visitors, and waiting times. Our selection of field offices was based on data for the years indicated.

Appendix III: Functions of Field Offices and Other Entities in Medical Disability Determinations for Disability and SSI Claims

	Claimant contacts SSA field offices

If reconsideration is not favorable,  claimant has 60 days to request a  hearing before an administrative  law judge (ALJ)

		Application process begins

Figre : GAO ly of SSA d; Art Exploion (imge).

Appendix IV: Comments from the Social Security Administration

Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments

	GAO Contact

	Staff Acknowledgments

In addition to the individual named above, key contributions to this report  were made by Blake Ainsworth, Assistant Director; Mary A. Crenshaw,  Analyst-In-Charge; Justin Fisher; Mitchell Karpman; Matthew Lee; Vanessa  Taylor; Walter Vance; Charles Willson; Gregory Wilmouth; and Paul Wright.

Related GAO Products

Social Security Administration Field Offices: Reduced Workforce Faces  Challenges as Baby Boomers Retire. GAO-08-737T. Washington, D.C.:   May 8, 2008.
Social Security Disability: Better Planning, Management, and  Evaluation Could Help Address Backlogs. GAO-08-40. Washington, D.C.: December 7, 2007.
Social Security Administration: Additional Actions Needed in Ongoing  Efforts to Improve 800-Number Service. GAO-05-735. Washington, D.C.:  August 8, 2005.
SSA Customer Service: Broad Service Delivery Plan Needed to Address  Future Challenges. GAO/T-HEHS/AIMD-00-75. Washington, D.C.: February  10, 2000.
SSA’s Management Challenges: Strong Leadership Needed to Turn Plans  Into Timely, Meaningful Action. GAO/T-HEHS-98-113. Washington, D.C.:  March 12, 1998.
Social Security Administration: Significant Challenges Await New  Commissioner. GAO/HEHS-97-53. Washington, D.C.: February 20, 1997.
Social Security Administration: Effective Leadership Needed to Meet  Daunting Challenges. GAO/HEHS-96-196. Washington, D.C.: September  12, 1996.
Social Security: Sustained Effort Needed to Improve Management and  Prepare for the Future. GAO/HRD-94-22. Washington, D.C.: October 27,  1993.

Summary:
Why GAO Did This Study

Millions of people rely on the services of Social Security Administration (SSA) field offices. In fiscal year 2008, SSA's approximately 1,300 field offices provided service to about 44 million customers. People visit field offices to apply for Social Security cards, apply for retirement and disability benefits, establish direct deposit, and a host of other services. Over the last several years, staffing reductions have challenged field offices' ability to manage work while continuing to deliver quality customer service. To better understand the challenges SSA faces in delivering quality customer service, GAO was asked to determine (1) the effect that staffing reductions are having on field office operations and (2) the challenges SSA faces in meeting service delivery needs in the future and the agency's plan for addressing them. In May 2008, GAO reported initial observations on the effects of reduced staff levels. To conduct this work, GAO interviewed SSA headquarters and field officials and analyzed various data on SSA's workloads and customer service.

What GAO Found

Staffing constraints are having adverse effects on field office services. The number of staff in field offices dropped 4.4 percent from 2005 to 2008. As a result of greater efficiencies, field office work produced fell only 1.3 percent during the same period. To manage the reduced staffing, SSA deferred work deemed as a lower priority, such as conducting reviews of beneficiaries' continuing eligibility. However, deferring these reviews means that beneficiaries who no longer qualify for benefits may still receive payments erroneously. Reduced staffing also impacted key customer service indicators. In fiscal year 2007, more than 3 million customers waited for over 1 hour to be served. Further, SSA's Field Office Caller Survey found that 51 percent of customers calling selected field offices had at least one earlier call that had gone unanswered, but for methodological reasons, the unanswered call rate was likely even higher. These factors may have contributed to a 3 percent drop in SSA's overall customer satisfaction rating from 84 percent in fiscal year 2005 to 81 percent in fiscal year 2008. Increases in retirement and disability filings and a significant retirement wave of SSA's most experienced staff pose difficult challenges for SSA in meeting future service delivery needs. SSA estimates that retirement and disability filings will increase the agency's work by about 1 million annual claims by 2017. Further, SSA will experience an agency-wide retirement wave in the coming years--the agency projects that 44 percent of its staff will retire by 2016. SSA published its new strategic plan in September 2008, which calls for SSA to eliminate the backlog of disability hearings and increase online retirement filings to 50 percent of applications. While discussing the plan with us, SSA officials noted that it is not intended to be a service delivery plan detailing how the agency will address the service needs of the retiring baby boom generation. While the plan includes the goal of significantly expanding the use of electronic services, it is not clear how this will mitigate the increasing SSA workload.