The PIC correspondence group has technical writers and subject matter experts on the team. There is no escalation. They call ED for help when a guarantee agency or lender does not respond. They also work closely with ED on politically sensitive letters. But much of this service is really out of scope and they always have a question about how far to go with the customer.
Some calls relate to what is coming in the future, but very few.
They provide general information and they have access to the information they need. Sometimes a question stumps them but they will research the question until they find an answer and then call the customer back. Their questions are becoming more and more technical however. Although they can respond to a caller, they may not be able to actually resolve the issue. They do not have the authority to actually process an application through the system although they can do some corrections now.