Personnel shortage in BAföG office

The BAföG Office is currently experiencing problems with the timely processing of BAföG applications. As in many other offices and institutions, there has been an immense shortage of staff for some time, not least due to a high level of sick leave. As a result, the case workers are difficult to contact at the moment and many applicants have to wait an unusually long time for their decisions.

We know that the situation is unacceptable. But even if new colleagues have started at the beginning of the year, they need a certain amount of time to familiarize themselves with their areas of responsibility. In the coming days, we will take measures to relieve the workload of the available case workers so that they have even more time to process the applications. One of the first steps will be to extend the telephone hours so that the many inquiries do not come to nothing.

Even if many people are currently - and rightly so - quite annoyed, we ask for your understanding in this exceptional situation. We assure you that we will do everything in our power to ensure that the applications are processed more quickly. Unfortunately, this is only possible at the moment if the available staff is exclusively occupied with processing the applications. Thank you very much!