The National Ranking Report run for the period ending March 8, 2009 showed that out of the 149 Social Security hearing offices in the United States, the Indianapolis hearing office ranked 146 for processing time. The average number of days it took the Indianapolis hearings office to process a request for hearing was 734 days which is just at 2 years! The Fort Wayne hearings office ranked 138 for processing time for the same period. Fort Wayne’s average time to process a request for hearing was 666 days or 1.8 years.
The same report for the period ending December 2008 ranked the Indianapolis hearing office 145 out of 147 office in the United States. The average number of days it took the Indianapolis hearings office to process a case was 721 days. In December 2008, the Fort Wayne hearings office ranked 114 in the nation, taking an average of 564 days to process a hearing request.
On March 24, 2009, the Commissioner of Social Security testified before the subcommittee of Congress which has oversight of the Social Security program. Commissioner Astrue projected that SSA will receive more than 2.9 million disability claims in 2009, an increase of 300,000 cases over last year. The Commissioner hopes that hiring more staff and judges will deal with both the backlog and the increase of new cases.