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YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY West/Midwest Region

Davenport Social Security Administration
4319 N. Brady Street, Davenport, Iowa
(855) 420-8556   Mon.–Fri. 9 a.m.–4 p.m.

Rock Island Social Security Administration
2350 4th Avenue, Rock Island, Illinois
(866) 414-9166   Mon.–Fri. 9 a.m.–4 p.m.

Social Security Celebrates 90 Years of Service to the American People

Recently. the Social Security Administration (SSA) proudly commemorated its 90th anniversary, marking its unwavering commitment to the financial security and dignity of millions of Americans. Since President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law on August 14, 1935, the program has grown into one of the most successful and
trusted institutions in American history. At a recent ceremony in the Oval Office, President Trump signed a presidential proclamation reaffirming his commitment to protect Social Security and celebrating the customer service improvements that have occurred at the agency during his presidency.

“For 90 years, Social Security has stood as a promise kept, ensuring that older Americans, people with disabilities, and families facing loss have the support they need,” said Commissioner Frank J. Bisignano. “As we honor this legacy, we are also building a future where service is faster, smarter, and more accessible than ever before. Through President Trump’s vision, we are protecting and preserving Social Security by delivering extraordinary customer service through technological improvements and enhanced process engineering.”

This year, 72 million beneficiaries will receive over $1.6 trillion in payments—making Social Security a lifeline for retired workers, survivors, and people with disabilities and a cornerstone of retirement security across generations.

Since his swearing-in on May 7, 2025, Commissioner Bisignano has led a bold digital-first transformation of SSA’s operations, guided by a vision to make the agency a premier service organization. Within 100 days as commissioner of the agency, he has led SSA to achieve significant improvements in service delivery for the American people:

• Giving Americans 24/7 access to their personal my Social Security account, allowing more than half a million transactions to take place in the first three weeks, when
  previously the website was down 29 hours a week, reducing average wait time on the National 800 Number from 30 minutes last year to single digits last month
• Shortening field office wait times by 30%, and booking more appointments than ever before
• Upgrading phone systems in all field offices, allowing for 30% of all calls to be handled instantaneously through technology
• Enabling 90% of calls to be resolved via self-service or convenient callbacks
• Reducing the initial disability claims backlog by 26%, from 1.2 million to 940,000 cases
• Decreasing disability hearing wait times by 60 days, reaching historic lows
• Sending over 3.1 million payments totaling $17 billion to eligible beneficiaries five months ahead of schedule under the Social Security Fairness Act

Commissioner Bisignano’s modernization agenda emphasizes operational agility, data-driven performance, and a digital-first approach. His leadership has prioritized:

• Integration of technology to streamline phone inquiries and reduce errors
• Strengthening of data security following past breaches, with firm commitments to safeguard beneficiary information and eliminate fraud, waste, and abuse
• Workforce optimization to increase frontline capacity while maintaining service excellence

“Our strategy is clear: serve customer needs quickly and completely, no matter how they contact us,” said Commissioner Bisignano. “We are empowering our workforce and embracing innovation to ensure Social Security properly supports the American people and remains strong for the next 90 years.”

As SSA celebrates this milestone, it remains focused on its mission of delivering benefits accurately, efficiently, and timely. The agency continues to work with Congress, outside advocates, and the American public to strengthen Social Security and deliver on President Trump’s mandate to protect and preserve for generations to come.

For more information about SSA’s communications, initiatives, and accomplishments, please visit the agency’s Communications Corner at ssa.gov/news.

Social Security Gains Momentum: Meeting Customer Needs Online, on the Phone, and In-Person

The Social Security Administration (SSA) has announced substantial progress in service delivery outcomes resulting from focused technology enhancements and process
engineering. These improvements reflect Commissioner Frank J. Bisignano’s strategic vision to modernize SSA’s customer service—meeting people where they are, addressing customer needs at the first point of contact, and improving outcomes across all channels.

“Our vision is centered on providing outstanding service that works for everyone we serve—whether they call, walk into a field office, or choose to manage their benefits online,” said Commissioner Bisignano. “We are transforming the customer experience, investing in technology to build frontline capacity, and using real-time data to monitor performance across the board. We are delivering higher levels of customer service—and this will continue.”

With the implementation of new telephone technology on the National 800 Number and in SSA field offices, along with process engineering and better strategic resource alignment, SSA has expanded its capacity to handle work on the phones and in its field offices, resulting in improved service to the American people. Recent accomplishments include:

• SSA is handling more calls with a faster response time. The agency handled nearly 1.3 million calls on the National 800 Number last week, or 70 percent more than the same week last fiscal year, while reducing the average speed of answer to 6 minutes. This response time is down from an average of 18 minutes so far this year and 30 minutes last year, or an 80 percent reduction.
• SSA is reducing field office wait times. The agency reduced the wait time in field offices to 23 minutes so far this year, compared to 30 minutes last year, or a 23 percent reduction.
• SSA has also improved service for its customers online by eliminating the longstanding scheduled downtime of 29 hours a week for my Social Security. This enhancement has already enabled 125,000 more customers to access their online accounts in the first week.

These continued improvements across all of SSA’s customer service channels come just two weeks after the agency announced it completed sending over 3.1 million payments, totaling over $17 billion, to beneficiaries eligible under the Social Security Fairness Act (SSFA), 5 months ahead of schedule. When the SSFA became law on January 5, 2025, SSA identified about 2.8 million current Social Security beneficiaries whose benefits were reduced because of the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) or Government Pension Offset (GPO), including firefighters, police officers, teachers, and other critical public servants. The agency successfully completed actions on these beneficiaries’ records exceeding its original estimate of it taking a year or more.

At the same time, SSA has driven down disability backlogs. The initial disability claims backlog has been reduced to 940,000 pending cases—down from a record of over 1.2 million last year, or a 25 percent reduction. Average processing time has improved to five days faster than before Commissioner Bisignano’s tenure. SSA has also maintained historic lows of disability hearings pending, with average wait times reduced by 60 days since June 2024.

Commissioner Bisignano’s modernization agenda is designed to improve customer experience, foster operational agility, and build trust in government service. The agency remains committed to measuring what matters and flexibly deploying resources to sustain progress.

“Our strategy is clear: serve customer needs quickly and completely, no matter how they contact us,” said Commissioner Bisignano. “We will continue to evaluate our tools, technology, and processes to empower our workforce to provide best-in-class customer service to the American people.”

For more information about Social Security’s services, visit www.ssa.gov.

Social Security Adds 13 Conditions to Compassionate Allowances List

The Social Security Administration (SSA) today announced the addition of 13 new conditions to the agency’s Compassionate Allowances (CAL) list. The CAL initiative accelerates the disability application process for individuals with the most serious diseases and medical conditions that, by definition, meet Social Security’s statutory standard for disability benefits.

The newly added conditions are:

• Au-Kline Syndrome
• Bilateral Anophthalmia
• Carey-Fineman-Ziter Syndrome
• Harlequin Ichthyosis – Child
• Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation
• LMNA-related Congenital Muscular Dystrophy
• Progressive Muscular Atrophy
• Pulmonary Amyloidosis – AL Type
• Rasmussen Encephalitis
• Thymic Carcinoma
• Turnpenny-Fry Syndrome
• WHO Grade III Meningiomas
• Zhu-Tokita-Takenouchi-Kim Syndrome

With the inclusion of these 13 conditions, the CAL list now includes 300 conditions in total. Since the CAL initiative began, over 1.1 million people with severe disabilities have been approved through this accelerated disability process that is fully policy-compliant.

“We are constantly looking for ways to improve our disability programs and serve the public more effectively,” said SSA Commissioner Frank J. Bisignano. “By adding these 13 conditions to the Compassionate Allowances list, we are helping more people with devastating diagnoses to quickly receive the support they need. This is part of our broader commitment to making the disability determination process as responsive and compassionate as possible.”

When a person applies for disability benefits, Social Security must obtain medical records to make an accurate determination. The agency uses advanced technology to identify potential CAL conditions and expedite claims processing. Although not available in every claim, through the Health IT program, Social Security securely receives electronic medical records, allowing for adjudicators to make faster and more accurate decisions.

For more information about the initiative, including a list of all CAL conditions, please visit www.ssa.gov/compassionateallowances.

To learn more about Social Security’s Health IT program, please visit www.ssa.gov/hit.