Excepted Service Appointing Authorities
Excepted service appointing authorities are critical tools for increasing
employment opportunities for people with disabilities in the Federal Government.
Two of these authorities are particularly relevant:
- Schedule A, 5 CFR 213.3102(u), for hiring people with severe physical
disabilities, psychiatric disabilities, and intellectual disabilities.
This excepted authority is used to appoint persons with severe physical
disabilities, psychiatric disabilities, and intellectual disabilities. Such
individuals may qualify for conversion to permanent status after two years of
satisfactory service. Severe physical disabilities include but are not limited
to blindness, deafness, paralysis, missing limbs, epilepsy, dwarfism, and
more.
- Schedule A, 5 CFR 213.3102(11) for hiring readers, interpreters, and
personal assistants. This excepted authority is used to appoint readers,
interpreters, and personal assistants for employees with severe disabilities
as reasonable accommodations.
OPM has developed Bite Size Training on Using Schedule A Training to
Hire People with Disabilities. This 5-minute training provides managers and
HR staff with an helpful overview of what they need to know to hire people with
disabilities using Schedule A.
Documentation
In order to be eligible for employment through the Schedule A non-competitive
process, documentation of the disability is required. Such documentation is used
to verify that the individual being hired is indeed a person with an
intellectual disability, severe physical disability, or psychiatric disability.
This documentation must be provided to the hiring agency before an individual
can be hired. Documentation of eligibility for employment under Schedule A can
be obtained from a licensed medical professional (e.g., a physician or other
medical professional certified by a state, the District of Columbia, or a U.S.
territory to practice medicine); a licensed vocational rehabilitation specialist
(i.e., state or private); or any Federal agency, state agency, or agency of the
District of Columbia or a U.S. territory that issues or provides disability
benefits.
In addition, upon hiring, the individual with a disability or the agency
Human Resource office should complete the Standard Form 256. The SF-256 includes the legal
definition of disability and lists various disabilities, including several that
are considered targeted disabilities.
Applicants and employees with disabilities may also use the SF-256 to
voluntarily identify their particular disability for data collection purposes
only, even if they are not seeking to establish eligibility under Schedule A.
Data captured from the SF-526 is used to compile the disability demographics of
Federal agencies. This data is crucial for agencies to determine how well or
poorly they are achieving their disability hiring goals.
OPM recently updated SF-256 to better reflect current definitional language
with respect to the disability community. OPM also created a Bridge
Document that details the differences between the updated SF 256 and the
form previously used by OPM.
Agencies should begin using the updated SF-256 now, if they have not already
done so.