Recommendation: The Office of Special Counsel should require federal employees who are filing whistleblower disclosures or retaliation complaints to identify on their complaint forms their status as a permanent or probationary employee.

Agency: Office of Personnel Management: Office of Special Counsel
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Special Counsel should review and revise as appropriate, its policy for agency extension requests. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Office of Special Counsel
Status: Open

Comments: OSC is revising its practice of granting extensions when the agency provides a plausible explanation for the delay. Instead, OSC will be informing agencies at the outset of the referral that, with few exceptions, extension requests are less likely to be granted. OSC will also be communicating that failure to produce an investigative report within the statutory timeframe will result in notification of the agency's failure to the President and congressional committees under 5 U.S. C. 1213(c) (4). According to OSC, this new practice will be reflected in standard operating procedures for the OSC Disclosure Unit that the agency is currently revising.

Recommendation: The Special Counsel should communicate expected processing timelines to whistleblowers. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Office of Special Counsel
Status: Open

Comments: OSC has incorporated explicit language in its acknowledgement letters to whistleblowers that investigations may exceed the statutory timeframe. OSC has also now implemented a standard operating procedure of adhering to the 45-day timeframe for making a substantial likelihood determination under 5 U.S.C. 1213(b). According to OSC, it will be revising its acknowledgement letters to whistleblowers to reflect that OSC expects to make a referral determination within 45 days.

Recommendation: The Special Counsel should develop, document, and implement case processing procedures for OSC's Complaints Examining Unit, including procedures for how cases are prioritized, how to take favorable actions, how to balance obtaining favorable actions with meeting staff productivity expectations, and how cases should be reviewed by supervisors. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Office of Special Counsel
Status: Open

Comments: The Special Counsel convened an Effectiveness and Efficiency Working Group tasked with evaluating every unit's case process activities. The group issued recommendations in the spring of 2018, after which the Special Counsel announced a significant reorganization of OSC in the spring of 2018. Specifically, effective October 1, 2018, OSC created a new Intake Unit and merged the headquarters CEU with the Investigations and Prosecution Division (IPD). According to OSC, it continues to develop standard case processes, including procedures for prioritizing cases, obtaining favorable actions, establishing qualitative and quantitative performance expectations, and reviewing cases.

Recommendation: The Special Counsel should identify and implement additional controls and tools needed to ensure closed case files can be tracked and located efficiently. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Office of Special Counsel
Status: Open

Comments: The Clerk of OSC has identified and is implementing the following controls and tools needed to ensure closed case files can be tracked and located efficiently: (1) creation and utilization of file plans according to the OSC disposition scheduled for each unit (including inventory of records); (2) creation of an Archives and Records Centers for Information Sharing (ARCIS) account to manage functions related to OSC's Electronic Records Management System (ERMS), including retiring temporary records to the Federal Records Center (FRC), transmitting and tracking records requests to FRC, and transferring permanent records to the National Archives and Records Administration. According to OSC, the Clerk is further establishing policies and procedures, as well as staff training, for records retention, including but not limited to routine evaluations and assessments. OSC employs FOIA Xpress to locate open and closed cases in response to records requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

Recommendation: The Associate Director of Merit System Accountability and Compliance should ensure that OPM's finalized records schedule on retaining conversion case files specifically lists all documentation that must be saved in its case files. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Office of Personnel Management
Status: Open

Comments: In response to our recommendation, OPM drafted a retention schedule for its pre-appointment review case files. As of June 2019, according to OPM, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) was in the process of reviewing the draft retention schedule. Once NARA approves and OPM finalizes the schedule, OPM will be better able to maintain complete documentation to justify conversion request decisions and ensure such documentation is available for subsequent review. On July 8, 2020, OPM informed us it is getting closer to fully responding to this recommendation and providing us with appropriate documentation to support is efforts.

Recommendation: To help ensure the accuracy of MSPB's reporting on whistleblower appeals received and closed, the Chairman of MSPB should update MSPB's data entry user guide to include additional guidance and procedures to help improve the identification of appropriate whistleblower appeal closing codes to use.

Agency: Merit Systems Protection Board
Status: Open

Comments: MSPB is finalizing finalized expanded guidance and procedures on coding whistleblower data. MSPB is committed to ensuring that procedures are in place for identifying and using appropriate whistleblower codes; however, MSPB is limited by its various legacy applications with regard to the improvements related to data entry that can be implemented at this time. MSPB currently is in the process of designing new core business applications that will incorporate appropriate data quality, integrity, and accountability measures to further improve its data management practices. Until the new case management system is in production in FY 2020 or early FY 2021, MSPB remains committed to utilizing the resources necessary to ensure the accuracy of its reported data. To achieve this objective, experienced attorneys reviewed, validated, and, where necessary, corrected agency whistleblowing data prior to public release in FY 2016, FY 2017, and FY 2018. MSPB is committed to this extra layer of review for FY 2019, and will continue to evaluate how to achieve this objective given other workload and available resources. According to MSPB it expects additional progress on its efforts by July 2020.

Recommendation: To help ensure the accuracy of MSPB's reporting on whistleblower appeals received and closed, the Chairman of MSPB should add a quality check in MSPB's data analysis and reporting process to better identify discrepancies or other anomalies in data queries and the resulting datasets.

Agency: Merit Systems Protection Board
Status: Open

Comments: MSPB stated that it completed drafting the data integrity study mentioned in our previous response, looking at the current processes and integrity of case-related data as a whole throughout the agency. As explained above and highlighted in MSPB's FY 2018 Annual Report, MSPB's initiative to design and configure new core business applications currently is underway, and the findings in the study are integral to incorporating the appropriate data integrity processes, including quality checks and controls, into these new applications. According to MSPB it expects additional progress on its efforts by July 2020.