Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 25 October 2012
103. Deputy Micheál Martin asked the Minister for Social Protection if she will confirm the dates currently being processed by her Department in respect of invalidity pension applications; the action being taken to clear this backlog; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46914/12]
View answerThe Department is continually reviewing it processes in an effort to improve processing times and customer service. Many improvements have been introduced in Invalidity Pension Section. Since June 2011 all Invalidity Pension claims are processed on a new IT platform under the department's service delivery model project. A comprehensive business process improvement exercise has recently been completed within Invalidity Pension Section, the focus of which is to optimise performance and reduce waiting times. New processes and structures have been introduced in the area since June 2012. There is a dedicated team which deals with new invalidity pension claims. Currently, new claims are processed on receipt. A separate team is focused on the elimination of the backlog, which has been ring-fenced. That team is currently processing the final batch of these claims, all of which were received since January 2012 and are currently in receipt of illness benefit. However, there are some claims still awaiting decision which were received earlier than January 2012. These claims are awaiting a medical assessment or further information from the claimant.
The processing time for individual invalidity pension claims may vary in accordance with their relative complexity in terms of the qualifying criteria. In addition, factors outside the Department's control can have an impact, for example, insufficient information received from claimants at time of application and delays in claimants furnishing the information requested. Since the introduction of these new processes and structures, the number of pending claims has reduced from 7007 to 5372 from end May 2012 – end of September 2012 – and continues to reduce. Processes and procedures are continuously reviewed with the explicit objective of reducing delays and the situation is being closely monitored by my Department.
