Don ChewningSocial Security Booklet on Wisconsin Backlog of Hearing Cases
Posted by Don Chewning on September 11, 2009
As I have discussed previously, when a claimant in Wisconsin requests a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge, the wait for the hearing is over well over 18 months. This long wait is one of the toughest things for my clients to deal with. The Social Security Administration (SSA) has issued a report documenting the state of the backlog of hearing cases in Wisconsin. This report is the second quarter update for fiscal year 2009. It shows that the average processing time in Wisconsin is 618 days – more than 128 days longer than the national average. To give an idea of the age of some cases pending in Wisconsin consider the following from the report:
We started FY 2009 with 3,322 Wisconsin cases that will be 850 days old or more by the end of the fiscal year. Through March, we cleared 57.80% of these cases.
The report has some interesting graphs showing the average waiting time over time. It also shows how the current recession has resulted in an increase in the number of hearings requested. The SSA hopes to have the backlog of cases eliminated by 2013.
