The Bottom Line - Fall 2020 - 27

OFFICE OF PAY AND RETIREMENT SERVICES
HOW WE ARE SUCCEEDING

OPRS' RETIREMENT TEAM
By Jaininne Edwards

T

he Office of Personnel Management
(OPM) requires original signatures on all
documents pertaining to a civil service retirement (CSRS) application. Prior to transitioning
into situational telework, we negotiated with
OPM to allow our agency to submit applications using electronic signatures.  During this
period of situational telework, Mary Johnson,
Gloria Phillips and Keith Johnson have continued to process CSRS retirement applications
as if they were physically in the office.  Ms.
Johnson noted that the biggest adjustment
was moving into a paperless environment.
During this period of situational telework,
Tilithea Ransome, Keith Johnson, Gloria
Phillips and Karen Lomax have continued
to provide estimates on the retirement corrections to the District's human resources
community.  In collaboration with DCHR, a
SharePoint site has been developed to allow
all stakeholders to better track the progress
of retirement corrections.  The site is currently
being tested and will be demonstrated later
this month. 
Implementing EWORKS (Electronic
Workflow Operations Recordkeeping 
System) in 2019 proved to be a godsend

for our team.  Using the lean six sigma
principles, Karen Lomax, Karon Brown,
Janelle Daniels, Rachelle Smith and Tilithea
Ransome analyzed all the current processes
in place, determined areas where we could
streamline processes or eliminate a redundant step and built a proof of concept that:
*	 Leveraged KwikTag's ability to capture
documents from various sources i.e.,
email, mail, and fax.
*	 Reengineered the "as is" processes
to create a funnel for incoming mail,
faxes, and emails to be delivered and/
or scanned into KwikTag at the point of
entry; and
*	 Developed a workflow that enable
incoming work to automatically be
routed to the appropriate specialist for
action or approval which eliminated the
need for us to print documents. 
We are now preparing for the months
ahead when we begin facilitating the Federal
Employees' Health Benefits (FEHB) Open
Enrollment Season, year-end closing for
the federal police pension payroll and the
issuance of the annual 1099R forms to the
retiree population.  The team is poised and
ready to handle any challenges that may
come their way. *
FALL 2020 | 27
The Bottom Line - Fall 2020

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Bottom Line - Fall 2020
