The Office of Personnel Management set a new record for how swiftly it processes departing federal employees’ retirement claims last month, in the midst of an annual spike in requests.
In February, the federal government’s HR agency received 8,794 new retirement requests, a 32% decrease from the 12,997 claims filed in January. The period between January and April marks the busiest season of the year for retirement processing.
OPM processed 10,025 claims last month, marginally less than the 10,920 it completed in the same month last year, but good enough to bring the backlog of pending requests under 20,000 to 19,591. OPM states that its “steady state” goal for pending claims is 13,000.
