Social Security Administration: Better Planning Needed to Improve Service Delivery
Published: 2010-04-15T00:00:00

Fast Facts:

Highlights:
section_title: Why GAO Did This Study
paragraphs: Millions of people rely on the services of Social Security Administration (SSA) field offices. In fiscal year 2009, SSA's approximately 1,300 field offices provided service to a record 45.1 million customers. People visit field offices to apply for Social Security cards, apply for retirement and disability benefits, request replacement benefit checks, and a host of other services. Over the last several years, growing workloads have challenged field offices' ability to manage work while continuing to deliver quality customer service. The Subcommittee asked GAO to discuss our January 2009 report on SSA field office service delivery challenges. Specifically, this testimony will discuss (1) the state of SSA field office operations, and (2) the status of SSA's efforts to develop a plan to address future service delivery challenges. To respond to the request, GAO relied primarily on the January 2009 report titled Social Security Administration: Service Delivery Plan Needed to Address Baby Boom Retirement Challenges ( GAO-09-24 , Jan. 2009), and updated it with additional information provided by SSA. In that report, GAO recommended that SSA develop a service delivery plan that explains how it will deliver quality service while managing growing work demands. SSA agreed to develop a document that describes service delivery and staffing plans. No new recommendations are being made in this testimony.
section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: Since we last examined service at SSA field offices, SSA has expanded the level of staffing, and encouraged greater use of automated services. However, rapidly rising workloads have adversely affected customer service and the quality of some work, despite SSA's efforts. Recent hiring by SSA nearly restored field offices to their fiscal year 2005 level, but field offices have experienced rapid growth in their retirement and disability claims workloads. SSA used various strategies to manage the growing workload, including deferring some reviews of beneficiaries' continuing eligibility. However, deferring these reviews means that beneficiaries who no longer qualify for benefits may still receive payments erroneously. Key customer service indicators were also affected. In fiscal year 2009, more than 3 million customers waited over 1 hour to be served. Further, SSA's Field Office Caller Survey found that 58 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. SSA has not yet offered a plan to detail how it will address future service delivery challenges as GAO recommended in January 2009. With projected increases to SSA's workload from retirement and disability filings from the nation's baby boom generation, and a continued wave of retirements of experienced staff, the need for such a plan is greater than ever. SSA estimates about a 14 percent rise in Old-Age and Survivors Insurance, Disability Insurance (Disability), and Supplemental Security Income 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. In addition, based on SSA's projections, 41 percent of the current workforce will retire by fiscal year 2018. With such challenges, it is critical for SSA to develop a plan to discuss how it will address future challenges. SSA officials did not provide GAO with an update on where the agency stood in developing such a plan.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: I am pleased to be here today to discuss the state of Social Security  Administration (SSA) field office services. SSA’s approximately 1,300 field  offices serve a vital role as SSA’s primary contact with the public. In 2009,  a record 45.1 million people visited field offices to apply for Social  Security cards and benefits, and to request replacement benefit checks  and a host of other services. In January 2009, we issued a report that  discussed field office service challenges. In the time since our report, field  office staffing has increased slightly, nearly restoring staffing levels to  their fiscal year 2005 level. With the recent economic downturn, field  offices are facing more pressure than ever to meet service delivery needs,  and soon baby boomer retirements will stretch SSA field office staff even  further.
Today I will discuss (1) the current state of SSA field office operations,  and (2) the status of SSA’s efforts to develop a plan to address future  service delivery challenges. This testimony is based on our January 2009  report and updated with additional information provided by SSA. In  developing that report, we obtained various automated data on field office  staffing, productivity, and customer wait times. We also interviewed SSA  headquarters officials responsible for overseeing field office operations, as  well as managers and staff in 21 field offices, two Social Security Card  Centers, two regional offices, and three area offices. To update this  information, we obtained data from SSA, including data on staffing and  productivity, and interviewed SSA officials.
We conducted the work for our January 2009 report between July 2007  and January 2009 in accordance with generally accepted government  auditing standards and updated this information in April 2010. Those  standards require that we plan and perform the audits to obtain sufficient,  appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and  conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence  obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions  based on our audit objectives.
subsections: section_title: Background
paragraphs: 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 older  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 2009, these three benefit programs provided a combined total  of approximately $704 billion in benefit payments to nearly 59 million  beneficiaries. SSA projects that the benefit payments and number of  beneficiaries for the three programs will increase in fiscal year 2010.
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 original Social Security  numbers, and replacement Social Security cards;   Teleservice Centers, which offer national, toll-free telephone service; and    Program Service Centers, which make entitlement decisions for benefits,  as well as assist in answering 800-number calls.
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. SSA currently has 1,259  field offices, 8 Social Security Card Centers, and 29 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 571  contact stations. These stations provide very limited functions and are  staffed with one SSA field office employee who travels once a month to  certain locations, such as a hospital, to provide service to customers who  lack transportation or telephone access. Additionally, SSA has begun using  video conferencing to take claims and provide other services to customers  in remote locations. Forty-one field offices are currently using video  conferencing to provide service to customers and SSA is preparing to roll- out video conferencing to 80 additional offices. SSA also has a separate  video service project in the Denver region to help service geographically  diverse areas and provide tribal outreach.
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.
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. DDSs also conduct continuing disability reviews for  Disability and SSI beneficiaries to ensure that individuals are still  medically eligible for payments. For beneficiaries found eligible for  disability benefits, SSA periodically conducts disability reviews (CDR) of  beneficiaries’ earnings and work activity to determine if they are still  financially eligible to receive Disability benefits. SSA refers to these  reviews as “work CDRs.” SSA also conducts periodic reviews to  determine if SSI beneficiaries are still eligible to receive SSI payments  based on the beneficiary’s income, living arrangement, and other non- medical factors related to SSI—these reviews are referred to as SSI  redeterminations. One type of redetermination is a limited issue review,  which does not require a full review of eligibility.
section_title: Recent Hiring Has Helped Field Offices Manage Growing Claims Workloads, but Work Quality and Customer Service Have Declined
paragraphs: Since we last examined service at SSA field offices, SSA has expanded the  level of staffing, and encouraged greater use of automated services.  However, rapidly rising workloads have adversely affected customer  service and the quality of some work, despite SSA’s efforts.
subsections: section_title: Increases to Field Office Staffing Since Fiscal Year 2008 Has Helped Field Offices to Meet Growing Claims Workloads
paragraphs: Field office staffing stayed about the same from fiscal year 2005 through  2009, despite recent hiring, while the amount of work that field offices  produced increased by 2.1 percent (see table 1). As a result of greater  efficiency, the average amount of work produced by field office employees  increased by 2.6 percent from fiscal year 2005 to 2009. In fiscal years 2008  and 2009, SSA hired a combined number of 4,931 staff for field offices,  which helped to almost restore field offices to their fiscal year 2005  staffing level. The additional staffing helped to nearly erase field office  staffing reductions in fiscal years 2006 and 2007. In our January 2009  report, we reported that field office staffing declined by 4.4 percent from  fiscal years 2005 through 2008, but the amount of work that field offices  produced had decreased by only 1.3 percent.
Increases in SSA’s fiscal year 2008 and 2009 budget appropriations and  American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) funding  enabled SSA to provide more staffing resources to field offices. Table 2  shows SSA’s final appropriations for fiscal years 2002 through 2009. The  table also shows the changes in recent staffing.
According to SSA officials, SSA plans to maintain field office staffing  levels in fiscal years 2010 and 2011 by providing for a 1:1 replacement rate  for staff who leave the agency. SSA is planning to use its fiscal year 2010  and 2011 funding to increase staffing in state DDS offices and SSA hearing  offices to reduce disability backlogs; the Commissioner has identified  reducing the appeals hearing backlog for disability cases as the agency’s  top priority.
The demand for field office service and claims workloads has grown to  record levels. Comparing fiscal years 2006 and 2009, visitor volume  increased by about 3.2 million customers, from 41.9 million to 45.1 million.  If the visitor volume during the second half of fiscal year 2010 is the same  as the volume during the first half, the volume will again be 45.1 million by  the end of the fiscal year. Also, from fiscal year 2005 through 2009, SSA  processed a growing number of OASI, Disability, and SSI claims  (nonmedical determinations only), which SSA attributes to the onset of  the baby boom generation’s retirements and the economic downturn (see  fig. 1).
section_title: SSA Has Used Several Different Strategies to Manage Growing Workloads
paragraphs: Even with the increases in field office staffing in fiscal years 2008 and  2009, and some increases in average productivity by employees, many field  office managers, responding to a survey conducted in February 2010 by  the National Council of Social Security Management Association, Inc.  (NCSSMA),  stated that staffing levels are inadequate to deal with the  growing public service challenges they face daily in field offices. In this  survey, over 95 percent of the managers said that they need to hire at least  one more employee to provide adequate public service, 89.2 percent said  they need at least two more employees, and 71.2 percent said that they  need at least three more employees.
SSA continues to use various strategies to manage work in field offices,  such as shifting work among field offices, based on their workloads,  encouraging customers to make greater use of automated services, and  deferring certain field office work. For example, if an office has work  demands that it cannot immediately cover, that office can request that  some work be transferred to another office. SSA is also encouraging  customers to use automated services. SSA reported that in fiscal years  2008 and 2009, respectively, the public performed 4.0 million and 6.1  million electronic transactions. SSA reported that electronic filings for  retirement benefits grew from approximately 407,000 to 833,000 from  fiscal year 2008 to 2009, respectively; this represented 18.9 percent and  32.2 percent of the total retirement applications filed in fiscal years 2008  and 2009. As result, SSA is making progress toward achieving the goal it  set in its fiscal year 2008 Agency Strategic Plan to achieve an online filing  rate of 50 percent of retirement applications by 2012.
With regard to deferring work, SSA has deferred a significant number of  SSI redeterminations since fiscal year 2003. Although SSA increased the  number of SSI redeterminations in fiscal year 2009 above the 2008 level,  the number of reviews remains significantly below the fiscal year 2003  level. Specifically, SSA conducted about 719,000 or 30 percent fewer SSI  redeterminations in fiscal year 2009 than it did in fiscal year 2003.  However, if SSA completes the number of SSI redeterminations it is  projecting for fiscal year 2010, it will be close to the fiscal year 2003 level.  Further, the Congress has stated that it is concerned about delays in  processing work-related CDRs. Our data show that SSA increased work-  related CDRs from about 106,500 in fiscal year 2003 to about 175,600 in  fiscal year 2006. However, the number of work CDRs has decreased  slightly since 2006, and SSA projects that it will conduct about 174,200  work CDRs in fiscal year 2010 (see fig. 2).
Reviews of continuing eligibility are key activities in ensuring that benefits  are paid only to those individuals entitled to them. A fiscal year 2008  Supplemental Security Income Stewardship Report showed the correlation  between the number of SSI redeterminations conducted and the  overpayment accuracy rate. The data showed that as the number of SSI  redeterminations and limited issue reviews decreased, the overpayment  accuracy rate for SSI payments declined from 93.6 percent in fiscal year  2005 to 89.7 percent in fiscal year 2008, the lowest level in over 30 years.  The report stated that the primary reason for overpayment inaccuracies is  failure of SSI recipients and their representative payees to report changes  that affect payment, such as changes in income and resources. SSA  estimates that CDRs yield a lifetime savings of about $10 for every dollar  invested, while SSI redeterminations save $8 over 10 years for every dollar  invested.
section_title: Pressures to Meet Increased Workload Demands May Have Contributed to Adverse Effects on Field Office Operations
paragraphs: Pressures on field office staff to meet increased workload demands may  have adversely affected the quality of some work. According to the 2010  NCSSMA report, 87.4 percent of survey respondents reported that they  receive complaints weekly from the public about the accuracy or  timeliness of the work being produced, and 82.5 percent reported that the  number of quality case reviews performed in their office is insufficient to  ensure an accurate and timely work product. Also, although the  percentage of customers rating SSA service favorably (excellent, very  good, or good) has remained stable at 81 percent since fiscal year 2007, the  rating has declined from its fiscal year 2005 level of 85 percent, and  continues to fall short of the agency’s 83 percent goal.
Pressures on field office staff may have also contributed to a further  decline in customers’ satisfaction with field office service than in previous  years. According to SSA’s fiscal year 2008/2009 field office caller survey, 58  percent of callers got a busy signal or a recording that lines were busy  when they called field offices—up from 45 percent in fiscal year 2007, and  55 percent in fiscal year 2008. 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  higher. The decline in field office phone service is further evidenced by  results of the 2010 NCSSMA report—64.6 percent of managers said that  they were able to provide prompt telephone service less than half the time;  virtually all of the managers (98.1 percent) reported that they receive  weekly complaints about telephone service provided by their office; and  another 67.8 percent of survey respondents said that the increased volume  of visitors coming into their office is due in moderate or large part to the  inability of their office to provide prompt telephone service. SSA has  undertaken efforts to improve telephone service in field offices. SSA  initiated a pilot program in 2007 called “Forward on Busy” in 25 field  offices to address deficiencies with phone service. SSA has since  converted the pilot into a regular program, and 147 offices are  participating. Under the program, calls receiving a busy signal at field  offices are automatically forwarded to a Teleservice Center. In another  effort to improve its telephone service, SSA awarded a $300 million  contract to build a Voice over Internet Protocol telephone system for field  operations. This system will allow SSA to fully integrate its telephone  system and data network, which will provide for faster call routing to any  geographic location, and quicker access to caller information.
While SSA made some improvements in customer waiting times in fiscal  year 2009, SSA data show that the number of customers waiting for over 2  hours remained about the same. Compared to fiscal year 2008 waiting  times, SSA increased the number of customers who waited from 0-60  minutes from 92.1 percent to 92.5 percent; decreased the number of  customers who waited for 61-120 minutes from 6.8 percent to 6.6 percent;  and remained about the same (1 percent) for customers who waited for  more than 2 hours (see table 3).
In our January 2009 report, we recommended that SSA establish standards  for field office customer waiting times and phone service to help identify  and improve offices with poor service. SSA did not act on this  recommendation stating that it would create problems by diverting staff  already spread thin across field offices.
section_title: SSA Has Not Developed a Plan to Describe How It will Address Future Service Delivery Challenges
paragraphs: SSA has not yet offered a plan to detail how it will continue to do more  work with fewer resources and achieve its strategic goals. In our 2009  report and prior reports, we recommended that SSA develop a service  delivery plan to outline how it would deliver quality service while  managing growing work demands and limited resources. SSA partially  agreed with our recommendation, stating that it had a number of  documents, including its strategic plan, which discusses how it will meet  future service delivery needs. However, because of a continuing concern  about the agency’s lack of a consolidated plan to address service and  staffing, SSA agreed to develop a single document to describe its plan for  addressing future service delivery challenges. SSA officials did not provide  us with an update on where the agency stood in developing this plan.
With projected increases to SSA’s workload from retirement and disability  filings from the nation’s baby boom generation, and a continued wave of  retirements of experienced staff, the need for such a plan is greater than  ever. For fiscal years 2010 through 2017, SSA projects that the agency will  consistently have workloads of approximately 11 million claims (see fig.  3), which is significantly higher than the workloads processed during fiscal  years 2005 through 2008, as previously noted in figure 1.
As we stated in our January 2009 report, it will be more difficult for SSA to  meet higher workload challenges as a result of the anticipated retirement  of many of the agency’s most experienced field office workers. Based on  SSA’s projections, 22 percent of SSA’s current workforce will retire by  fiscal year 2013, and the figure will grow to 41 percent by fiscal year 2018.  SSA’s projections show that a significant portion of the losses will come  from supervisory staff, who are among the agency’s most experienced  staff. For example, SSA projects that 38 percent of supervisory staff are  eligible to retire now, 54 percent will be eligible in five years, and 66  percent will be eligible in 10 years. It will take years for SSA to rebuild the  decades of knowledge that will be lost from these retirements. Field office  managers and staff we spoke to told us that it typically takes 2 to 3 years  for new employees to become fully proficient. Given this, SSA is likely to  experience declines in productivity as new staff replace more experienced  staff. Therefore, SSA will need to do more to compensate for such  declines.
section_title: Concluding Observations
paragraphs: While SSA is managing increasing workloads resulting from growing  retirement and disability claims, it still faces the challenge of providing  quality service. SSA’s management of increased workloads came at a  cost—the accuracy rate for SSI overpayments fell to the lowest level in 30  years, and some customer service continues to decline. These problems  may become more severe as workloads continue to grow from the nation’s  baby boom generation, waves of SSA’s most experienced staff retire, and  the current level of field office staffing stays flat. Such challenges make it  essential for SSA to develop a plan to manage its increasing workload.  Whether SSA will need more resources or an altered field office  infrastructure, or both, is unclear. We still believe that 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.
Mr. Chairman, this completes my prepared statement. I would be happy to  respond to any questions you or other Members of the Subcommittee may  have at this time.
section_title: Contacts and Acknowledgment
paragraphs: For further questions about this statement, please contact Barbara D.  Bovbjerg at (202) 512-7215 or bovbjergb@gao.gov. Individuals making key  contributions to this statement included Blake Ainsworth, Mary Crenshaw,  Paul Wright, and Charlie Willson.
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