Disability Determination Services (DDS) state agencies make initial and reconsideration determinations on Social Security disability claims. These agencies have had massive turnover in the past few years. I used to work repeatedly with the same group of disability examiners. These days, I am constantly seeing new examiners. Adding to the turnover problem, it takes months to train a new disability examiner. This is causing significant delays with claims at DDS agencies.

In New Hampshire, for example, pending cases at Reconsideration are spending over 180 days in “staging” before a new disability examiner is even assigned. That’s 6 months just waiting for the claim to be assigned. Making a new determinsation will take another 3-4 months. That is just too long.