Imagine sending in your retirement paperwork and then waiting months for the check that pays your mortgage. That’s the reality tens of thousands of federal employees are facing as the Office of Personnel Management grapples with a surge of applications that has pushed its inventory toward 50,000 unfinished cases.
By the numbers
In November alone OPM received roughly 23,000 retirement applications, following more than 20,000 in October — about three times the volume from a year earlier. At the end of November 2025 the agency’s inventory stood at about 48,396 pending applications, compared with roughly 13,844 at the same time in 2024. The backlog includes both paper and digital submissions and represents a bottleneck with real financial consequences for retirees who are waiting to start receiving full benefits.
Why the pileup happened
Two big forces collided. First, a wave of departures tied to widespread downsizing — the so‑called Fork in the Road deferred resignation period — produced a burst of retirees coming off agency rolls around the same time. Second, OPM moved to force most new retirement packages into its Online Retirement Application (ORA) system: a June memo set a firm June 2 start date for digital submissions and, by mid‑July, paper packages were to be returned for resubmission through ORA.
Yet the transition wasn’t clean. In November, OPM logged 7,833 ORA submissions and, surprisingly, 15,560 paper packages — a sign that agencies or separating employees still relied on paper workflows or received exceptions. That mix of late, concentrated filings overwhelmed staff and systems at OPM’s Retirement Operations Center in Boyers, Pennsylvania.
The human cost
For many federal employees the holidays became a month of uncertainty: pensions delayed, Thrift Savings Plan rollovers stalled, and benefits that cushion retirement beginning later than planned. For employees who timed retirements around housing contracts, medical coverage, or other fixed costs, the backlog isn’t an abstract number — it’s missed paydays and extra stress.
Can tech help? Maybe — but cautiously
Moving applications online was the right move in principle. A single, well‑designed intake system should reduce manual handoffs and speed processing. But digitization alone isn’t a cure. Agencies need consistent submission practices, staff trained to use the digital tools, and enough processing capacity at OPM to clear peaks.
Automation and AI could play a role in triage: sorting complete packages from incomplete ones, flagging missing documents, and routing files to the right reviewers. Emerging generative and agentic tools point the way toward smarter workflows — not unlike consumer and enterprise features described in recent AI product coverage — but any automation must be built into secure, auditable processes. See how agentic booking and automation are being framed for other large systems in discussions about AI tools and workflow automation here and how in‑house models are being used in enterprise settings here.
A word of caution: tech deployments can introduce new failure modes. System updates and configuration issues have caused serious disruptions elsewhere, reminding government IT leaders that resilience and rollback plans are essential; a recent update-driven outage that triggered BitLocker recovery prompts is the kind of operational snag agencies want to avoid during any digital transition here.
What OPM and agencies could do next
- Standardize intake: every agency should follow the same electronic submission checklist so OPM receives consistent packets.
- Staff surge capacity: bring on temporary reviewers or reassign trained personnel during predictable spikes tied to policy timelines.
- Use staged automation: start with simple document verification and missing‑item flags before automating benefits calculations.
- Improve communication: give retirees clear, frequent status updates and an expected timeline so people can plan.
The backlog is not just a process problem; it’s a test of how the federal government manages large workforce shifts in a digital era. Fixing it will require operational muscle, better agency coordination, and careful use of tools that speed work without adding fragile dependencies. For the thousands of people whose retirements are now unfolding in pauses and hold notices, the urgency is immediate — and the solutions need to move faster than the paperwork has so far.