The Social Security Administration is rolling out nationwide systems in the coming months that will impact how the agency schedules appointments for initial claims and triages its workload to employees.

SSA employees told Federal News Network that they’re used to processing claims submitted locally, but will soon tackle a nationwide inventory of cases.

Employees are wary that these changes will introduce more complexity to their workloads, as well as a higher risk of overpayments that SSA would have to claw back.

“Someone who applies in California could be speaking to an SSA rep in Maine,” one SSA employee said.

SSA is rolling out a National Appointment Scheduling Calendar (NASC) and National Workload Management (NWLM) for all field operations, digital services, and processing centers. Both systems will launch on March 7.

According to a Dec. 19 memo obtained by Federal News Network, the NASC will replace SSA’s current system for scheduling initial claims appointments, as well as local field office calendars.

SSA employees will use the NASC to schedule all initial claims appointments, and will also allow the public to self-schedule initial claims appointments.

The National Workload Management system will serve as the agency’s central workload management system. According to the memo, the system will distribute work to employees nationwide based on their “skillset, knowledge, and availability.”

“Employees will be assigned work by the NWLM based on the skillsets that they have, as determined by management. As a normal part of their routine duties, employees will be assigned to the NWLM and will be expected to use the tool to receive their workload assignments,” the memo states.

These systems will impact all employees in SSA field offices, digital services and processing centers.

“Both the NASC and NWLM are necessary to modernize our appointment systems and to provide a more balanced and consistent experience for both technicians and customers,” the memo states.

Richard Couture, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Council 215, said the union received notice of these changes, and that negotiations will soon begin.

A second SSA employee told Federal News Network that the purpose of these changes is to “smooth over” staffing shortages. The agency lost about 7,000 employees through voluntary incentives last year. It also relocated many of its employees from its headquarters and regional offices to field offices.

The employees said these upcoming changes would give staff “much less prep time” to handle a nationwide pool of cases.

“We are used to taking claims only for people in our area, so we expect to run into problems,” the second SSA employee said.

State laws introduce another layer of complexity to these cases. Some states, for example, have a higher income limit for SSA programs like Supplemental Security Income.

SSA employees outside Alaska aren’t familiar with how to treat annual payments adult residents receive from the state government based on oil revenue. Those payments from the Permanent Fund Dividend count as income to SSA programs like Social Security Income, and could potentially reduce benefits.

Many states offer a supplement to SSI benefits to help cover living costs for low-income seniors, as well as blind or disabled individuals. Those supplement amounts and eligibility vary state-by-state.

Some states let SSA manage these supplements, resulting in one combined check, while other states process their SSI supplements as a separate payment. Other states don’t offer these SSI supplements.

“We don’t have answers on how we are supposed to handle this,” the second SSA employee said.

The first SSA employee said staff were briefed on these changes this week. The employee said staff submitted multiple requests to management seeking clarification on these points, but were told to “worry about today, not tomorrow.”

Andy Sriubas, SSA’s chief of field operations, told employees in a Nov. 25 memo that the agency is taking steps to centralize more of its work.

“For decades, our ~1,250 field offices have operated as independent ‘mini-SSAs.’ That model no longer serves the public or our people. It prevents true specialization, limits the impact of technology, and produces backlogs we should not sustain,” he wrote.

Sriubas wrote that field offices “will always remain” as the agency’s primary point of contact in in-person services, and field office staff should be able to focus on serving people “face-to-face with empathy, accuracy, and speed.”

“Still too often, a day’s work is not finished in a day – impacting wait times, appointments, and pending items. That is not the level of service the American people deserve, nor is it the standard any of us should accept,” Sriubas wrote.

Sriubas wrote the agency’s website and the national 1-800 number handle “intake tasks well,” but said field operations “must evolve into a truly national system that leverages our full capacity.”

“The future is one SSA: a modern, client-centered agency where people receive service how, when and where they want it — online, by phone, or in person — regardless of their physical location, and every workflow flows to the team best equipped to complete it quickly and correctly,” he wrote.

SSA walks back memo limiting in-person services

In a separate memo, which an SSA spokesperson said has been rescinded, the agency directed field offices to only schedule initial claims over the phone, and to restrict in-person visits.

The memo, dated Dec. 31, directed field office employees to “convert all in-office appointments” scheduled on or after Jan. 6 to telephone appointments, and to “zero out all in-office availability” for appointments scheduled on or after March 9.

“This change prepares field offices and teleservice centers for the upcoming implementation of the National Appointment Scheduling Calendar,” the memo states.

The memo said in-person initial claim appointments would only be scheduled in “limited circumstances” when an appointment over the phone isn’t possible. Examples include an individual requiring a sign-language interpreter or who doesn’t have access to a phone.

“Only field office management may decide if an in-office appointment is appropriate; technicians must obtain permission from local management prior to scheduling the appointment,” the memo states.

According to this memo, the NASC will allow SSA to schedule initial claim appointments “based on national capacity, rather than local field office calendars.”

“Under NASC, [initial claim] appointments will be scheduled using available technician capacity nationwide, including first available appointment times across all U.S. time zones,” the memo states. “This shift supports a more consistent and efficient approach to IC scheduling and expands access by allowing the public to self-schedule IC appointments online.”

An SSA spokesperson told Federal News Network that “erroneous instructions recently issued have been withdrawn and our employees have been notified.”

The spokesperson said in a statement that the agency is still scheduling in-person appointments for initial claims, “and will continue to provide the public with in-person service at our more than 1,200 field offices nationwide.”

“We remain committed to ensuring that all individuals have access to the services they need and serving everyone in the way they wish to be served, including the option for in-person assistance,” the spokesperson said.

The second SSA employee, however, told Federal News Network that these plans will proceed, even if the memo outlining these changes has been rescinded.

“They are absolutely going forward with this plan. I expect there could be delays, but they have every intention of making this happen,” the employee said.

SSA is looking to cut visits to its field offices in half this year. NextGov/FCW first reported on SSA’s plans to cut 15 million field office visits this year.

The post Social Security seeks nationwide system to manage caseload for smaller workforce first appeared on Federal News Network.

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