OPM Retirement Backlog Crisis in 2026: 65,000+ Federal Employees Waiting for Their Pension — What You Need to Know
If you are a federal employee planning to retire in 2026, you are walking into the worst OPM retirement backlog in modern history. As of March 2026, there are over 65,000 pending retirement applications sitting at the Office of Personnel Management — an 88% increase since October 2025. In February alone, OPM received 31,240 new retirement claims while only processing 18,149. The math is brutal: applications are coming in nearly twice as fast as they are being processed. That means thousands of federal retirees are sitting at home right now — months after their last paycheck — receiving partial interim payments and waiting for OPM to finalize their annuity. Some have been waiting 4 to 8 months . Some cannot reach their agency HR because those offices were gutted by the Deferred Resignation Program. This guide from Warrior Retirement gives you the full picture: why the backlog exists, how long you should expect to wait, what you will receive during the delay, and the exact ste...