Federal Telework after Return-to-Office: GAO’s Findings on Service Delivery, Workforce Risk, and SSA’s Planning Gap

In January 2026, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) examined how telework was used from July 2019 through May 2025 at three customer-facing federal components—the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), the Social Security Administration (SSA), and the Department of State’s Bureau of Consular Affairs (CA)—and how their approaches shifted following the President’s January 2025 Return to In-Person Work memorandum and related guidance. The core finding is not simply that telework declined; it is that agencies generally lacked the evaluative infrastructure to determine telework’s performance implications, even as telework posture became intertwined with recruitment, retention, and operational continuity.

Across all three agencies, officials indicated telework likely affected operations, including retention dynamics, but also emphasized that broader labor-market and workload pressures were major drivers of staffing challenges. At SSA and CA, officials described employees leaving—or considering leaving—for organizations offering greater telework availability. GAO frames telework, therefore, less as a discrete “benefit” and more as a variable in a larger human-capital equation that directly bears on service timeliness in high-volume programs.

BIA presents a case where telework had already been declining and where in-person work was often preferred or required by mission realities. GAO notes that BIA ended routine telework as return-to-office requirements took effect, and officials reported that limited telework availability was one factor—among several—potentially exacerbating staffing challenges. Yet GAO also documents structural explanations for service backlogs, such as persistent staffing limitations, funding issues, and probate process dependencies that are largely orthogonal to telework status.

SSA is the report’s focal point because GAO identifies a specific, actionable risk: emerging skills gaps in mission-critical occupations, partially driven by employees seeking greater flexibility, at the same time SSA is pursuing workforce reductions and organizational reshaping. GAO emphasizes that SSA’s leaders viewed telework as a meaningful recruitment and retention tool, but that SSA had not updated a human capital plan capable of systematically identifying, retaining, and deploying the talent needed to deliver timely service under the new operating model. GAO further connects this planning gap to long-standing service pressures, where delays in claims processing and customer access have been driven by multiple operational factors, not telework alone.

CA illustrates a different dynamic: telework use was limited even during peak telework periods, and GAO reports that telework likely did not affect passport processing times; instead, surges in demand and attrition were key contributors to delays. Still, CA officials described losing staff to other agencies with more telework, underscoring that even low-telework environments can experience telework-driven competition effects.

GAO’s recommendations are directed solely to SSA: (1) update SSA’s human capital plan to ensure identification and retention of mission-critical staff in light of telework posture changes and organizational restructuring, and (2) evaluate SSA’s telework program to identify issues, make adjustments, and assess effects on performance.

Disclaimer: This blog post summarizes a GAO report for informational purposes only. It does not constitute legal, policy, human-resources, or operational advice. Readers should consult the underlying GAO publication and appropriate professionals before making decisions based on these themes.