A recent article in the Washington Post warns of worsening SSA services including increased processing times, inability to answer the phones, and inability to process payments.  The Social Security Administration’s (SSA) already struggling services are expected to worsen in 2023, despite an additional $785m added to its budget last year, according to the agency’s acting head, Kilolo Kijakazi. In a letter to leaders of the House and Senate appropriations committees, Kijakazi explained that while the funding added aimed to improve phone operations and reduce record backlogs in the disability system, the pandemic’s impact on the agency’s workforce had weakened the service to the extent that it could take years to recover. This news has disappointed advocates who have called for greater bipartisan commitment to ensure the SSA has the necessary resources to continue functioning. As previously reported, the agency is still struggling to restore basic customer service almost a year after reopening its field offices to the public.

Viner Disability Law is extremely familiar with the worsening services.  We often spend more than 30 hours each week (staffing combined) waiting on hold to obtain vital information necessary to process cases.  Moreover, we observe initial applications are taking much longer to process, even compared to 2021.

Find the full Washington Post article here.

2/21/2023