An office of the Social Security Customer Service in Wisconsin reduces more than 58% of its workers in the coming weeks. It is one of the 41 fields on the ground where the staff are reduced by more than a quarter due to Trump’s budget cuts.
These are fewer people to answer phones, manage meetings in person and process documents at a time when retirees flood the agency phones and visit offices in mass due to fear that the economy efforts of the White House will endanger their advantages.
Business Insider obtained and consulted the list of offices, which appeared on the Social Security Administration website on Sunday but is no longer visible. The SSA has more than 1,000 locations, but the DOGE commission of the White House plans to close more than 25. Already, around 6 million elderly people are 45 miles or more than one.
“The moments when you have to go to the Social Security office are when, often, something really bad has happened to you,” said Bill, Bill Sweeney, Vice-President of AARP government affairs. The non -profit organization has also reported record volumes of older Americans concerned about their monthly checks.
The shortcut in field offices is accompanied by major changes to social security. In accordance with the Trump administration’s cost reduction objectives for federal agencies, the SSA announced that it would reduce 7,000 employees out of a total of 57,000 – which would place social security workforce to a historic hollow. New identification requirements in person have offices that are preparing for a steep influx of visitors. As of April 9, nine offices in the field also returned to telephone service only, but these locations do not seem to have direct overlap with offices faced with a reduction of 25% or more of the staff.
The SSA previously declared to BI that a recent mandate of return to the office will help relieve the challenges of customer service. The Trump administration said that BI changes to the SSA are because the president is a “managing” of taxpayers’ dollars. Trump said the new policies that SSA will reduce fraud to benefits, which represented 0.84% of the total inappropriate payments between the 2015 and 2022 exercises, according to the Office of the Inspector General of the SSA. He said he would not reduce the advantages.
“The unnecessary loss of the staff of the field office will exert greater pressure on the workload on the remaining employees, which will depress morale and will probably induce more employees from, etc.” high attrition will lead to waiting times and higher treatment delays for beneficiaries, and will increase the risk of office closings in the field due to the lack of staff. “
Related stories
Business Insider tells the innovative stories you want to know
Business Insider tells the innovative stories you want to know
Staff reduction efforts also mean that employees who stay at the agency are invited to consider voluntary reallocities in “critical” positions in field offices and call centers. On April 3, the employees received an email from the Human Resources of the SSA. The email, which was consulted by BI, said that the staff had until April 7 to volunteer: “More than 1,000 of your colleagues have already intensified our mission – but we need more of you to join them.” It is not yet clear how many employees have accepted the offer or what positions they will be able to fill.
The weakness of the staff causes anxiety for the beneficiaries
As the staff of the field office falls, the request for SSA services – or the desire to ensure that the advantages are secure – has taken root among certain beneficiaries. The agency has seen its daily calls increase from 50,000 from February to March, and the agent’s occupied price, which follows the number of calls hears a pre -recorded disconnection message when they want a representative, has skyrocketed. During an agency meeting of March 28 shared publicly, a social security worker said that 665,000 people had visited the field offices the previous week – an “important” influx of potentially concerned beneficiaries. Recurrent website failures also make beneficiaries difficult to get help.
For the elderly, this means a scenario of chicken and eggs: the concerns concerning social security lead them to call more and to show more, which potentially leads to more work for a decreasing workforce. This could exacerbate anxiety all around.
When visiting a campaign office, people are “already stressed,” said Sweeney.
“Having to spend hours and hours fighting with phones and having to drive long distance to an office just to prove things that you can prove by phone – it just adds a lot of insults to the injury here.”
Do you have a tip? Contact these journalists via the signal at Alliekelly.10 and Julianakaplan.33, or send an email to allisonkelly@insider.com And jkaplan@businessinsider.com. Use a personal email address and a non-work device; Here is our guide to share information safely.
businessinsider
