So, With an Unlimited Budget, I Guess Five Months is Good Enough for an Option Letter.

In December 2019, I wrote a complaint about how NYCERS was taking six or more months to produce final benefit letters for newly retired members.

At the March 11, 2021 Board of Trustees meeting, the "Chief Operations Officer" reported to the trustees that NYCERS was now getting the benefit letters out in five months and had met its goal. She also asked if she could stop reporting to the trustees about the benefit letters as long as she was meeting the five-month goal. The trustees agreed to the request.

I am sorely tempted to call the trustees stupid but that is not accurate. The decision they agreed to was stupid just like paying $245M/yr for bad investment advice.

First of all, five months is a poor goal. The traditional goal is three months. Second, they now have no way of knowing whether this goal is being maintained. Third, this is the key monthly production figure for NYCERS along with the number of loans issued each week. It should be the highlight of the executive director's monthly report to the trustees.

Note: There is no civil service title at NYCERS for chief operations officer. In fact the legal civil service title is deputy executive director and there is another person in that position. That person is legally responsible for the functions being assigned to the "COO". I suspect, however, that person is on her way out. Here we have the Dilbert Principle in full bloom.