Disposal of Sensitive Documents at the Social Security Administration (Limited Distribution) (A-15-06-26014)

Our objective was to determine whether employees properly disposed of sensitive documents in accordance with the Social Security Administration's (SSA) policy.

Since the issuance of our November 2004 report, the Agency made improvements regarding its disposal of sensitive documents. Those improvements included revisions to the Administrative Instructions Manual System to clarify policy and specifically address requirements when destruction was performed by a third party, and the modification of a contract to require the contractor to shred all white and mixed paper. However, we found areas of noncompliance with the Headquarters' recycling contract and SSA policies. Additionally, we found there were no written contracts with recycling companies in three of the offices we visited in one SSA Region. We made six recommendations to SSA for improvements in its handling of sensitive documents.

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