Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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507. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the average waiting times for various appeals in respect of schemes or payments run by her Department; her plans to reduce such waiting times thereby easing the stress on families; her plans to introduce online appeal hearings to help deal with any backlogs that have arisen due to Covid-19; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [40475/20]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Social Welfare Appeals Office functions independently of the Minister for Social Protection and of the Department and is responsible for determining appeals against decisions in relation to social welfare entitlements.

The information required by the Deputy in relation to average waiting times for schemes that are subject to appeal is set out in the attached table below.

The time taken to process an appeal reflects all aspects of the appeal process, including the time spent in the Department preparing the appeal submission. The quasi-judicial nature of the system impacts on appeal processing times which are proportionate to the complexity of many of the issues under appeal.

There has been a decrease in overall processing times to date in 2020 with appeals requiring an oral hearing taking an average of 26.7 weeks (26.9 weeks in 2019) and summary decisions taking 15.8 weeks (22.1 weeks in 2019) to finalise. Given the nature of the payment, Supplementary Welfare Allowance appeals are prioritised at all stages of the appeal process. During 2019 it took an average of 17.6 weeks for those appeals to be decided summarily and 27.8 weeks to determine those appeals requiring oral hearing. For the period January to October 2020 the figures are 13.9 weeks for summary appeals (94% of the total) and 28.3 weeks for appeals requiring an oral hearing (6% of the total).

At the end of 2019 there were 8,788 appeals waiting to be determined. The number of appeals waiting to be determined at the end of October 2020 was 5,944 (a reduction of 32%). Processing times will continue to be a key focus of the Chief Appeals Officer.

I am advised by the Chief Appeals Officer that it is currently not possible to facilitate in-person oral hearings due to Covid-19 restrictions. The Social Welfare Appeals Office has recently commenced conducting online appeal hearings. In addition, appeal hearings are being conducted via telephone, where suitable. Appeals are also being determined on the basis of written submissions.

I trust that this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.

Appeal Processing Times by Scheme 1 January 2020– 31 October 2020

	Average processing times (weeks)Summary Decisions	Average processing times (weeks)Oral Hearings
Bereavement Grant	21.0	-
Blind Person’s Pension	24.2	38.6
Back To Work Family Dividend	18.7	-
Carer’s Allowance	11.8	22.8
Carer’s Benefit	18.6	23.0
Carer’s Support Grant	12.8	24.9
Child Benefit	29.4	37.7
Death Benefit	29.7	-
Deserted Wife’s Benefit	23.4	60.4
Disability Allowance	11.5	19.2
Disablement Pension	29.2	33.8
Domiciliary Care Allowance	21.3	33.2
Farm Assist	20.4	23.8
Guardian's Payment (Contributory)	19.4	41.1
Guardian's Payment (Non-Con)	22.5	39.3
Illness Benefit	28.1	29.7
Incapacity Supplement	19.3	-
Insurability of Employment	28.4	83.8
Invalidity Pension	18.9	31.4
Jobseeker's Allowance (Means)	17.9	32.3
Jobseeker's Allowance (Payments)	18.0	34.7
Jobseeker's Benefit	14.9	23.7
Jobseeker's Benefit Self Employed	14.4	-
Jobseeker's Transitional	21.2	27.6
Liable Relatives	35.8	-
Maternity Benefit	17.6	-
Medical Care	46.5	-
Occupational Injury Benefit	28.0	27.7
One Parent Family Payment	21.3	48.2
Partial Capacity Benefit	41.7	52.9
Paternity Benefit	14.1	-
Recoverable Benefits & Assistance	33.3	-
State Pension (Contributory)	25.1	32.8
State Pension (Non-Contributory)	23.3	36.7
Supplementary Welfare Allowance	13.9	28.3
Treatment Benefit	21.2	-
Widow/Widower's Pension (Contributory)	34.7	35.2
Widow/Widower's Pension (Non-Contributory)	29.4	35.5
Widowed Parent Grant	19.3	-
Working Family Payment	17.6	30.5
All Appeals	15.8	26.7