Program Integrity and Analysis

From: Ellie Fitzjarrald, Director and Mary Riggen, Chief, Program Integrity and Analysis

Our awesome salmon from FY 2009 are approaching their goal and have the wide open ocean sparkling up ahead. With 10 of 12 months of payment accuracy data available (October through July) our salmon are navigating with a “school” (statewide) average of 95.6%. What’s especially impressive is that there were no reportable payment errors in the months of May and July!

We now have 5 of 12 months of payment accuracy data available (October through February) and are pleased to report that our salmon are navigating even more successfully than in our last update.

Attached are two posters to display in your office lobbies.

From: Mary Riggen-Ver, Chief, Program Integrity and Analysis

Just a couple more months of the Preliminary Swim remain before we see some indication of how our salmon are starting out on their Successful Navigation to Awesome Performance. While some of you may be excited about this, others may be asking what on earth salmon have to do with program accuracy. The answer to that is nothing really. However, we are known world-wide for our wild Alaska salmon, and our state fish is the king salmon. So what better way to ride out the waves to awesome performance than with our winning Alaskan salmon?

Successfully Navigating to Awesome Performance with the SNAP Salmon Challenge!

2009 Accuracy Improvement Campaign

From: Mary Riggen-Ver, Chief, Program Integrity and Analysis

Our little SNAP salmon are now testing out the water in the “Preliminary Swim”. The Preliminary Swim reflects the first 9 months of FFY 2008 Food Stamp payment accuracy (October 2007 through June 2008). The plan to use a 4-month rolling average wasn’t feasible as some really large unrepresentative client caused errors occurred during those 4 months that skewed the data and inaccurately reflected our work. Our little salmon have been struggling a bit lately as they try to figure out how to navigate. Our FFY 2008 Food Stamp payment accuracy rate now stands at 92.8%, well below our 96% payment accuracy rate for FFY 2007.

2007 Food Stamp Accuracy Improvement Campaign
From: Jim Dalman, Chief, Program Integrity and Analysis

You may have noticed on the DPAWeb page header that our fourth month average Food Stamp Program payment error rate has dropped to 2.3%. This average is a good indicator of the current accuracy trend and a promising sign of where our accuracy rate is headed. Now this part is good. For the first time since our payment accuracy improvement campaign began in 2003 every region is above our accuracy goal. It’s the first time in over 10 years that half way through the sample year all of our regions have better than 95% accuracy. Give me Five! This truly is remarkable progress that is quickly moving us up in the national performance rankings. Keeping up this pace of improvement could put is in competition for a significant performance bonus. We can do that.

GIVE ME FIVE! 2007 Food Stamp Accuracy Campaign

We’ve set campaign sights on attaining 95% Food Stamp Program payment accuracy for 2007. Nearly three months of the Quality Assessment sample are complete, and we are off to a good start. Our accuracy rate now stands at 93.8%. On a hopeful note, we often get off to a slow start, yet this year is a bit better than we’ve been at this point in the past few years. A couple of client-caused errors pushed the rate up, so I’m confident that our improving agency-caused error rate is a good sign that will carry us to our accuracy goal.

BETTER THAN AVERAGE!
2006 Food Stamp Accuracy Campaign Update

From: Jim Dalman, Chief, Program Integrity and Analysis

Our Better Than Average accuracy campaign quest for 94% food stamp payment accuracy continues. We have completed the first three months sampling and our accuracy rate is 90.7%. A bit better than where we were last month, but still shy of our goal. Achieveing high accuracy takes continuous focus and thoughtful office by office approaches to assuring work quality. It gets harder to dig out if our accuracy rate falls too far early in the year. Success hinges on our steady monthly improvement over the next nine months.