United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2002-12-20 monographic deposited born digital 31 p. GA 1.13:GAO-03-158R https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R P0b002ee180385004 f:d03158r DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-28 GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R GAO-03-158R Claims processing Compensation claims Performance measures Postal service employees Reporting requirements Workers compensation Federal Employees Compensation Program Correspondence A05771 In fiscal year 2000, U. S. Postal Service employees accounted for about one-third of both the federal civilian workforce and the $2.1 billion cost of the Federal Workers' Compensation Program (WCP). During that same year, Postal Service employees submitted 85,000 claims, or one-half of all claims for new work-related injuries, to the Department of Labor's (DOL) Office of Workers' Compensation Program (OWCP), which is charged with administering the program. Because of complaints the subcommittee received from injured federal employees about the untimely receipt of WCP benefits and because Postal Service employees account for such a large portion of the WCP, the Chairman, House Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management, and Intergovernmental Relations, Committee on Government Reform, asked us to determine specifically whether Postal Service employees were receiving WCP benefits in a timely manner. For our current review, we agreed to (1) determine the extent to which Postal Service employees provided all of the evidence required by OWCP regulations for determining the claimants' eligibility for WCP benefits and (2) determine whether claims for WCP eligibility and WCP compensation payments for lost wages or schedule awards were submitted and processed within the time frames set forth in OWCP regulations or performance standards. On the basis of our analysis, we estimate that in about 99 percent of the cases involving Postal Service employees who (1) had work-related injuries during the 12-month period beginning July 1, 1997, and (2) filed claims for WCP benefits for lost wages or schedule awards due to these injuries, the employees eventually provided OWCP the evidence it required to make a determination on their eligibility for benefits. However, in about 69 percent of the cases, OWCP claims examiners had to request additional information because all of the required evidence needed to make a determination of WCP eligibility was not provided initially. As a result, claims for WCP eligibility were not always processed within the time frames set forth by OWCP. For those Postal Service employees in our sample cases who were determined to be eligible for WCP benefits and later filed claims for compensation for lost wages or schedule awards, we could not reliably estimate the percentage of claims for compensation that were processed within the time frames set forth by OWCP. This was because the dates we needed to "mark" the beginning and ending actions taken by the injured Postal Service employee and Postal Service supervisor to complete, submit, and forward claims to DWCP were missing from the claim forms. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R/html/GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R.pdf GAO-03-158R https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-03-158R Correspondence GAO-03-158R; Postal Service Employee Workers' Compensation Claims Not Always Processed Timely, but Problems Hamper Complete Measurement; Claims processing Compensation claims Performance measures Postal service employees Reporting requirements Workers compensation Federal Employees Compensation Program