Federal Employee Medical Retirement: Accountability

One often asks the question, “Well, how long can they…” or “Isn’t there some law that can force them to…”   Ultimately, such questions asked, and any similar or related ones, in the entire process designated as “Federal Disability Retirement process under FERS” has to do with the question of accountability.  Have you ever noticed that, where X is accountable to Y, X can be subjected to persuasive arguments, and will often be compliant?  But the larger question is, Who is Y accountable to?  And therein lies the problem.

That Agency to whom all other agencies are accountable, knows no sense of accountability, but will be the first to hold all others accountable.  Thus, the intermediate agency in a Federal Disability Retirement case, the one who employs the Federal or Postal employee, can be persuaded to complete the Federal Disability Retirement packet and to fulfill its obligations, because such an agency cannot “preempt” the statutory authority of the Office of Personnel Management.  But what argument can be made of the final arbiter, the Office of Personnel Management?

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire