[Federal Register Volume 72, Number 154 (Friday, August 10, 2007)]
[Notices]
[Pages 45079-45081]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E7-15663]


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SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION


Agency Information Collection Activities: Comment Request

    The Social Security Administration (SSA) publishes a list of 
information collection packages that will require clearance by the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in compliance with Public Law 
104-13, the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, effective October 1, 1995. 
The information collection packages that are included in this notice 
are for new information collections and revisions to OMB-approved 
information collections.
    SSA is soliciting comments on the accuracy of the agency's burden 
estimate; the need for the information; its practical utility; ways to 
enhance its quality, utility, and clarity; and on ways to minimize 
burden on respondents, including the use of automated collection 
techniques or other forms of information technology. Written comments 
and recommendations regarding the information collection(s) should be 
submitted to the OMB Desk Officer and the SSA Reports Clearance 
Officer. The information can be mailed, faxed or emailed to the 
individuals at the addresses and fax numbers listed below:

(OMB), Office of Management and Budget, Attn: Desk Officer for SSA, 
Fax: 202-395-6974, E-mail address: [email protected]

(SSA), Social Security Administration, DCBFM, Attn: Reports Clearance 
Officer, 1333 Annex Building, 6401 Security Blvd., Baltimore, MD 
21235,Fax: 410-965-6400, E-mail address: [email protected]

    The information collections listed below have been submitted to OMB 
for clearance. Your comments on the information collections would be 
most useful if received by OMB and SSA within 30 days from the date of 
this publication. You can obtain a copy of the OMB clearance packages 
by emailing [email protected].
    1. Consent Based Social Security Number Verification Process--0960-
NEW.

    Note: Please note that we published the 60-day Federal Register 
Notice for this collection on December 30, 2005, at 70 FR 77439. For 
the year and a half following that date, we have communicated with 
multiple businesses interested in this collection and have 
significantly altered our business process plan based on their 
comments.

Background

    The Social Security Administration (SSA) has provided limited fee 
based Social Security Number (SSN) verification service to private 
businesses and other requesters that obtain a valid, signed consent 
form from the Social Security Number Holder. Based on the consent 
forms, SSA verifies the Number Holders' SSNs for the requesting party. 
The Privacy Act of 1974, 5 U.S.C. 552a(b), section 1106 of the Social 
Security Act, 42 U.S.C. 1306, and SSA regulation at 20 CFR 401.100 
establish the legal authority for SSA to provide SSN verifications to 
third party requesters based on consent. Currently, the consent-based 
SSN verification service for high volume requesters is a paper-driven, 
labor-intensive process. In recent years, the demand for SSN 
verification has grown within the business community. As a result, SSA 
is developing an Agency strategy to perform fee based SSN verifications 
with consent in a high volume, centralized process.
    The Consent Based Social Security Number Verification (CBSV) 
process is the first phase of the Agency's long term strategy to 
provide the business community with fee based disclosures with consent 
in high volume. SSA is developing CBSV as a user-friendly, Internet-
based application with safeguards that will protect the public's 
information. In addition to the benefit of providing high volume, 
centralized SSN verification services to the business community in a 
secure manner, CBSV also will provide the Agency with inherent cost and 
workload management benefits.
    SSA is in the planning stage of developing the Agency's second 
phase of the fee-based web service system which would provide private 
industry and other third party requesters with disability and 
retirement data (including insured status information, dates of 
entitlement, and benefit amounts). This process, the Consent Based 
Benefit Information System (CBBI), would assist private insurance or 
pension benefit companies to determine private entitlements and 
coordinate entitlement to such benefits. These actions help the 
requesters to reduce and/or eliminate the overpayment of these benefits 
to their insured clients. Similar to the CBSV process, companies would 
be required to enter into a legal agreement with SSA, obtain written 
consent from the record holder, reimburse SSA, and follow SSA's 
established systems security and audit guidelines.

The CBSV Collection

    The CBSV is a fee-based automated SSN verification service that can 
be used by private businesses and other requesting parties who register 
with SSA to use the system and have obtained valid consent from Number 
Holders. The purpose of the information collection is to verify for the 
requesting party that the submitted name and SSN match or do not match 
the information contained in the SSA records. After completing a 
registration process and paying the fee, the requesting party can 
submit a file through the CBSV Internet application containing names of 
Number Holders who have given valid consent, along with each Number 
Holder's accompanying SSN and date of birth (if available) or obtain 
real-time results using a web service application or SSA's Business 
Services Online (BSO) application. The Agency matches the information 
against SSA's Master File of Social Security Numbers, using SSN, name, 
date of birth and gender code (if available). If batch mode was used, 
the requesting party retrieves the results file from SSA; the results 
file indicates a match or no match for each SSN submitted.
    Under the CBSV process, the requesting party does not submit the 
consent forms to SSA. SSA will require each requesting party to retain 
a valid consent form for each SSN verification request for a period of 
seven years. The requesting party is permitted to retain the consent 
forms in either electronic or paper format.
    To ensure the integrity of the CBSV Process, SSA has added a strong 
audit component that requires audits (called

[[Page 45080]]

``compliance reviews'') at the discretion of the agency with all audit 
costs to be borne by the requesting party. These reviews will be 
conducted by independent certified public accountants (CPAs) to ensure 
compliance with all the terms and conditions of the parties' agreement 
with SSA, including a review of the consent forms. This review is 
performed at the requesting party's place of business to ensure the 
integrity of the process. In addition, SSA reserves the right to 
perform unannounced onsite inspections of the entire process including 
review of the technical systems which maintain the data and transaction 
records at the requesting party's place of business.
    The respondents to the CBSV collection are the participating 
companies, members of the public who consent to the SSN verification, 
and CPAs who provide compliance review services.
    Type of Request: New information collection.

Time Burden

    Participating Companies:

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                                                                                      Average
                                                     Number of     Frequency of     burden per       Estimated
                   Requirement                      respondents      response        response      annual burden
                                                                                     (minutes)         hours
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Registration process............................              90               1             120             180
Creation of file with SSN holder identification               90            *251              60          22,590
 data; maintaining required documentation/forms.
Using the system to upload request file, check                90             251               5           1,883
 status, and download results file..............
Storing and maintenance of consent forms........              90             251              60          22,590
Activities related to compliance review.........              90             251              60          22,590
                                                 ---------------------------------------------------------------
    Total.......................................  ..............  ..............  ..............          69,833
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* Please note there are 251 Federal business days per year on which a requesting party could submit a file.

    People Whose SSNs Will Be Verified:

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                                                                                      Average
                                                     Number of     Frequency of     burden per       Estimated
                   Requirement                      respondents      response        response      annual burden
                                                                                     (minutes)         hours
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Reading and signing authorization for SSA to          10,000,000               1               3         500,000
 release SSN verification.......................
Responding to CPA re-contact....................           4,500               1               5             375
                                                 ---------------------------------------------------------------
    Total.......................................  ..............  ..............  ..............         500,375
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    CPAs (conducting compliance review and preparing written report of 
findings):
    Number of Respondents: 90.
    Frequency of Response: 1.
    Average Burden Per Response: 4,800.
    Estimated Annual Burden: 7,200 hours.
    Total Collective Burden: 577,408 hours.

Cost Burden

    The public burden cost is dependent upon the number of companies 
and transactions. The first year cost estimates below are based upon 90 
participating companies submitting a total of 10 million transactions. 
The total cost for developing the system is $5.6 million. $2.6 million 
will be required prior to development of the system. The $3.0 million 
that SSA has already expended will be recouped over the depreciable 
life of the system based on the fee per transaction model.

 One-Time Per Company Registration Fee--$5,000
 Estimated Per SSN Transaction Fee--$0.27 \1\
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    \1\ The annual costs associated with the transactions to each 
company are dependent upon the number of SSN transactions submitted 
to SSA by the company on a yearly basis. For example, if a company 
anticipates submitting 1 million requests to SSA for the year, their 
total transaction cost for the year would be $0.27 x 1,000,000 or 
$270,000. Periodically, SSA will calculate its costs to provide CBSV 
services and adjust the fee charged as needed. Companies will be 
notified in writing of any change and will have the opportunity to 
cancel the agreement or continue service using the new transaction 
fee.
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 Estimated Per Company Cost To Build Web Service--$200,000 \2\
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    \2\ A company may choose to submit batch files via the SSA Web 
site or submit real-time individual requests via the SSA Web site. 
There is no public burden cost with either of these methods of using 
the CBSV system.
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 Estimated Per Company Cost To Store Consent Forms--$20,000
 Estimated Per Company Cost To Contract With CPA for Audit--
$8,000

    SSA will hold an ``open enrollment'' season. If more than the 
estimated number of companies enrolls, the estimated per SSN 
transaction fee cited above could be less.
    2. Medicare Quality Review Forms--20 CFR 418(b)(5)--0960-0707. The 
Social Security Administration (SSA) uses the Medicare Quality Review 
Forms collection to verify the information reported on Medicare Part D 
Subsidy applications (OMB No. 0960-0696) for a selected number of 
applicants. SSA is planning to expand the scope of this collection by 
conducting Quality Reviews with some current recipients of Medicare 
Part D subsidies who have recently undergone the redetermination 
process (OMB No. 0960-0723). This ICR is for two new appointment 
letters (forms SSA-9313 and SSA-9314) that such beneficiaries will 
complete to schedule an appointment for their Quality Review. The 
respondents are current recipients of Medicare Part D subsidies who 
have recently undergone a redetermination and who were selected for a 
Quality Review.
    Type of Request: Revision to an existing OMB-approved information 
collection.

[[Page 45081]]



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                                                                                  Average burden     Estimated
                Form No. and name                    Number of     Frequency of    per response    annual burden
                                                    respondents      response        (minutes)         hours
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SSA-9301 (Medicare Subsidy Quality Review Case            10,000               1              35           5,833
 Analysis Questionnaire)........................
SSA-9302 (Notice of Quality Review                        10,000               1              15           2,500
 Acknowledgement Form for those with Phones)....
SSA-9303 (Notice of Quality Review                         1,000               1              15             250
 Acknowledgement Form for those without Phones).
SSA-9304 (Checklist of Required Information;      ..............  ..............  ..............  ..............
 burden accounted for with forms SSA-9302, SSA-
 9303)..........................................
SSA-9308 (Request for Information)..............          20,000               1              15           5,000
SSA-9310 (Request for Documents)................          10,000               1               5             833
SSA-9309 (Life Insurance Verification Form).....           8,000               1              15           2,000
SSA-8510 (Authorization to the Social Security            10,000               1               5             833
 Administration to Obtain Personal Information).
SSA-9313 (Notice of Appointment Quality Review             4,500               1              15           1,125
 Acknowledgement Form)*.........................
SSA-9314 (Notice of Quality Review                           500               1              15             125
 Acknowledgement Form (unknown phone numbers)*..
                                                 ---------------------------------------------------------------
    Total.......................................  ..............  ..............  ..............         18,499
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* These are the two new forms being cleared in the current ICR for this collection.


    Dated: August 7, 2007.
Elizabeth A. Davidson,
Reports Clearance Officer, Social Security Administration.
[FR Doc. E7-15663 Filed 8-9-07; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4191-02-P