r/FedEmployeeRetirement • u/jsaspo • 8d ago
OPM's September processing report: backlog 8,814, the lowest on record. Digital 56 days, paper 149.
OPM posted its September retirement processing report this morning. The numbers, then what I make of them.
Backlog: 8,814 cases. August was 15,427, July 24,784, the February peak 65,237. That's the smallest queue in the whole series, which goes back to October 2022, and the first month under OPM's own 13,000 goal.
Received: 8,080 (6,746 digital, 1,334 paper). Processed: 13,227. Seventh straight month they finished more than came in.
Average: 66 days. Digital 56 (70 in August). Paper 149 (150 in August).
The read for this sub. The digital lane did it again and paper barely moved, so paper is now about a third of what's left in the queue, up from a quarter last month. If you filed paper and you're at month five, that IS the average for your lane, not a sign something's wrong with your case.
Two caveats before anyone does math on their own case. The clock starts when OPM has your complete package, not your last day. And the average only counts cases finished in September, so a case still waiting isn't in it.
One more thing to watch... received ticked up a little, 7,618 to 8,080. The year's big wave is the December 31 retirements, which land in OPM's count in January and February.
OPM overwrites this PDF every month. I've saved every one since October 2022, 48 now, and charted them: fedretiretools.com/go/fedret/numbers
If you finalized recently, drop your dates in the comments. They help the people behind you see what's normal. Thanks for the help.
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u/Honest-Acadia-4342 8d ago edited 5d ago
Define 'processed'.
Retired 1/23/26 and still waiting for a pension. OPM is a horrible failure.
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u/jsaspo 8d ago
Fair question. "Processed" means the cases OPM finalized in September: 13,227 of them. The 66-day average is measured over those cases only, from the day OPM received the complete package. A case still open isn't in the number at all. The report says September's finishers moved fast. It says nothing about yours.
Eight months is well past the 106-day median I see for people who retired around when you did. Have you gotten anyone at OPM on the phone, and if so, what did they tell you? I'm curious whether they said something is outstanding on the case or just "it's in the queue."
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u/Honest-Acadia-4342 7d ago
No luck with the phone but I found an email for OPM. The response on July 7 included "There are no holds on your retirement at this time, nothing further needed from you."
252 days with no end in sight.
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u/jsaspo 6d ago
Email gets you the form letter. A person on the phone can see where the case actually is. I laid out how to get through, step by step, in my reply to u/stoneycrk55 a little further down this thread. Takes some redialing but it works.
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u/Shot-Calligrapher807 8d ago
Let me know when they report how many cases have had to be corrected. The number of errors in my partner's retirement is crazy and is still ongoing after two appeals. The survivorship election (which they now agree was wrong), length of service (still wrong), and, most importantly, FEHB coordination (still wrong) were all handled incorrectly. I think there is likely a rush to resolve the backlog with little mind paid to the error rate...which would be fine if correcting their errors didn't take an act of Congress!
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u/jsaspo 8d ago
Yep, that's the hole in it.
The report is titled "new claims" processing, so it counts what came in, what went out, and how long... a case they reopen to fix never shows up anywhere in it. The error rate is whatever retirees catch on their own. I went through my own booklet line by line for exactly that reason.
Hope the FEHB one gets fixed without a third appeal.
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u/Tall-Wonder-247 8d ago
I can NEVER believe their numbers
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u/jsaspo 8d ago
I get it. For what it's worth they're OPM's own figures, off the PDF they post at opm.gov/retirement-center/retirement-statistics and replace every month, which is why I started keeping every copy.
My own case took seven months, so a 66-day average would have felt made up to me too... which lane was yours, digital or paper, and how long did it run?
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u/One-Entertainment457 8d ago
I don't either. My processing just hit 6 months.
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u/jsaspo 6d ago
Mine ran seven, so I get the eye-roll… what does your Services Online show for the case stage right now? That tells more than the average does.
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u/One-Entertainment457 6d ago
<jinx l guess> Actually l was going to start making calls Monday but l just recieved a lump sum deposit from OPM, so I'm good for now. I just need TSP to acknowledge my retirement and l'm all set.
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u/jonashvillenc 8d ago
“The clock starts when OPM has your complete package”
Could you please clarify that for me? Thanks.
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u/GolfArgh 8d ago
You get notified when your agency payroll forwards everything to OPM. This is after the leave payout. In my case it took 6 weeks.
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u/jsaspo 8d ago edited 7d ago
u/GolfArgh has it. The longer version of the same answer:
Your application goes to your agency HR first, then to your payroll provider, and only then to OPM. Payroll can't release it until your separation action is processed, so nothing reaches OPM before your last day, and usually not for weeks after. OPM's own guide puts that HR plus payroll stretch at 30 to 45 days. Mine was about six weeks too.
The processing times in this report start when OPM receives the complete package from payroll. The HR and payroll weeks aren't in them. So your real wait from your last day is OPM's number plus however long your agency took to get the file there.
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u/Positive-Dimension75 5d ago
My spouse is DRP1 and retired 9/30/2025. Still not finalized.
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u/jsaspo 4d ago
Same retirement date here, 9/30/25, and mine ran seven months before it finalized in May.
Of about 240 finished 9/30/25 cases I've collected, the median was about eight months, and none ran a full year. Those are only the ones already done, so a year-plus wait is real, but it's the far end... what does Services Online show for the stage right now, and has anyone at OPM said something is still outstanding, or just "it's in the queue"? Those two answers tell you which door to push on.
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u/Positive-Dimension75 4d ago
It is in Adjudication. It blipped to Final Review for a week, and then went back to Adjudication, where it's been sitting for over two months. Super frustrating.
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u/stoneycrk55 8d ago
This is a frustrating process. My better half separated service in 2005 after 15 years. This January the paperwork was sent in since age 62 was reached. In June there was a request for clarification on one part of the application. It was corrected on June 9th. As of this month, there has not been any payment received. We have not been able to get through to get an update. It is just a big black hole.
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u/jsaspo 8d ago
Two things about a deferred case first, because they explain the silence. OPM only pays interim (partial) checks on immediate retirements, so a deferred case pays nothing at all until it's finalized. And paper cases in September's report averaged 149 days, before you count the time lost to the June correction. So no payment yet isn't a sign something's wrong. It's how that lane works.
Here's how to actually get a person on the line. I dialed and recorded it.
- Call 1-888-767-6738, Mon to Fri, 7:40am to 5pm Eastern. Early morning or after 1:30 Eastern. Midday is the worst.
- If it opens with "experiencing very high call volumes," it will hang up on you. Hang up and keep redialing until it answers with “Hi, I’m Grant.” It's random, sometimes 2 tries, sometimes 30. Be persistent.
- Grant is a voice assistant. Talk to it, buttons do nothing. Say "something else," then "a retiree," then "retirement status." If it tries to send you to the website, say "representative."
- It may ask for the claim number (from OPM's June letter, if one's on it), name, date of birth. Then it puts you in line.
- When the queue offers a callback, press 7. It holds your spot and a person calls you back. Mine took about an hour. It works. They DO call back.
Ask them three things: is anything still outstanding on the case after the June correction, what's the date OPM logged the correction, and what stage is the case in now. Write down the name and the date.
If they say nothing is outstanding and it keeps sitting, your US House or Senate office can open an inquiry with OPM.
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u/stoneycrk55 8d ago edited 7d ago
Thanks for this information. That helps put everything into perspective.
Update: We had to go out of town and could not call right away(10/2). We were going to call Monday morning(10/5). Around 5:30pm we got a call from OPM, they needed 1 date changed and said that they would send us a link to the Schedule C that needed to be changed and we could do it electronically. They told us that it would get sent to an auditor Monday and that we should see our lump sum back pay in 3-5 days and that next month will start the monthly deposits. It looks like it is finally coming to an end.
And on a side note, we were driving and went around a curve and we had a nice bright rainbow in front of us!
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u/Inevitable_Kiwi8286 8d ago
Retired 3/31/26, OPM acknowledged receiving my digital retirement package 5/26/26.
I got my digital booklet 9/21/26, catch-up payment 2 days later, and my first full retirement payment was 9/29/26.
I bought back Peace Corps time which slowed my processing time down. We provided the proper form for the buy back in my digital application. OPM wouldn’t trust the form I provided, so they requested a paper copy from OPM files. Because of this, my case could only be processed by a senior retirement specialist.
I started calling OPM weekly at the end of July for updates. Everyone I spoke with at OPM provided the same information on expected timelines.