Unless extended due to settlement efforts, amendment, or consolidation for investigating EEO complaints, agencies continued in fiscal 2005 to exceed the regulatory time of 180 days or less to process them.
There were 13,707 investigations completed in an average of 237 days for the year, and 7,523 –54.9 percent — of the investigations were completed on time, an improvement over 42.7 percent in fiscal 2004, the report said.
It said agencies issued 6,381 merit decisions without a decision by an EEOC administrative judge, and 3,770 — 59.1 percent — of these decisions were issued on time, up from the 43.6 percent in fiscal 2004.
The average processing time for a hearing was 249 days, a 29.9 percent reduction from fiscal 2004’s 355-day average — and the average processing time for appeals in fiscal 2005 was 194 days, a 6.3 percent reduction from the fiscal 2004 average of 207 days, according to the report.
It said that in fiscal 2005, agencies paid out $51.7 million in benefits, up from the $29.7 million paid in fiscal 2004, to EEO complainants as a result of final agency decisions, settlement agreements, and final agency actions in which agencies agreed to fully implement EEOC administrative judge decisions.
However, the report said that the amount paid out through appellate decisions dropped in fiscal 2005 from $22.1 million to $15 million.