View Full Version : Stolen Social Security payments
galveston
Jan 3, 2010, 01:20 PM
I just received notification from Social Security that every SS payment will be set back by 1 week.
That means that those slimy weasels (I'm being polite here!) in Washington have STOLEN 1 weeks pay from EVERY Social Security recipient.
In the case of my wife and I, that amounts to about $400 dollars! I wonder how many BILLIONS the total amount will be.
For those seniors who could barely make ends meet before, it will mean that they will be paying late fees for utilities, credit cards, etc.
All this after there being no COLA, in spite of rising groceriy and utility costs.
Thanks for NOTHING Washington!
JudyKayTee
Jan 3, 2010, 01:32 PM
Why are the slimy weasels changing your payment date by one week?
Catsmine
Jan 3, 2010, 01:45 PM
Why are the slimy weasels changing your payment date by one week?
The interest on all of the Social Security disbursements for one week would buy a Congressman. The Pres. Needs that.
galveston
Jan 3, 2010, 02:10 PM
Why are the slimy weasels changing your payment date by one week?
Think about it.
That week will never be given back. It's not just the interest, and it must amount to BILLIONS.
Now we see how Obama plans to finance his grandiose schemes. But even this will only be a small amount for that.
JudyKayTee
Jan 3, 2010, 02:12 PM
Again - what is the explanation given to you?
I can find nothing indicating that this is Nationwise - is it an error that is being corrected or something more than that?
galveston
Jan 3, 2010, 02:26 PM
No explanation, just notification from the SS administration.
No matter when you have been getting your check or deposit, it will be one week later now.
Nothing said about it being for one month either, so you can bet it's permanent.
JudyKayTee
Jan 3, 2010, 03:10 PM
YIKES! My fiancé retired and collects SS - he has received no such notification and his payment this month was right on time.
I'm off to research.
My stepdaughter is an Attorney with SS in Washington, DC. I called her to ask but she wasn't home so I left a message on her machine. She's in the disability hearings section but I'm sure she will know.
parttime
Jan 3, 2010, 04:24 PM
galveston, birthday determines when checks are received. What is your b day? Maybe there correcting the wrong delivery date on you.
JudyKayTee
Jan 3, 2010, 07:20 PM
My stepdaughter said that if payment date is changed it would be prorated. She is not aware that this is new policy and would like to know the number of the form or announcement (not your SS number; the number of the form).
She is not aware of any mass changes.
tomder55
Jan 4, 2010, 07:54 AM
Social Security uses a fairly simple calculation to determine your benefits . Philip Moeller of US News and World Report explains... (get your barf bag ready ) in a 3 part report that he just began . Here is the pertinent information in part 1
Social Security benefits are based on wage earnings, and exclude income from investments and other holdings. People must have earned wages in at least 40 quarters to qualify for benefits, and they must have earned at least a certain amount of money in a quarter for it to be counted. In 2009, the minimum quarterly earnings amount was $1,090. It rises each year to reflect changing wage and price levels; in 1979, for comparison, it was only $260.
For people with enough earnings to qualify, Social Security then takes the average of their 35 highest years of wage earnings. But it doesn't just take the actual amount of money earned each year, Goss explained. It engages in extensive calculations to equalize the value of wages over time. Given the long-term effect of inflation, for example, $10,000 earned in 1980 is worth a lot more than $10,000 earned in 2009.
The equalization process involves looking at every IRS W-2 and, for self-employment earnings, Form 1099, that is filed by taxpayers each year. I always thought my W-2s were only of interest to the IRS but Goss says those records are actually processed for the IRS by Social Security. "We get all the W-2s and we process them, and we add up all your wages," he says. "We do that for everybody in the country who has wages reported. We look at the total amount of wages and the total number of people reporting wages." Dividing the two numbers produces a national average wage for each year, and tracking the changes of that number over time produces a national average wage index.
Going back to our example of wages earned in 1980, Social Security would look at the ratio of the average national wage in 2009 and the national average wage in 1980 and adjust the value of what you earned in 1980 up to 2009 levels. It then would take the 35 highest annual adjusted earnings years and calculate an average.
Up until people reach the age of 60, this 35-year average is adjusted each year to reflect inflation and changing national wage levels. In the year in which you turn 60, Social Security stops indexing your wages.
Your Guide to Social Security, Part One - The Best Life (usnews.com) (http://www.usnews.com/money/blogs/the-best-life/2009/12/29/your-guide-to-social-security-part-one)
Clearly ;if you can calculate your own benefits then you are much better at math than I am.
That doesn't answer the question about the OP . I have found nothing to indicate that weekly payments would be stopped or delayed. But ;as you can surmise... The more complicated the benefit formula ;the more ripe it is for manipulations.
parttime
Jan 4, 2010, 11:20 AM
http://www.socialsecurity.gov/pressoffice/pr/corrected-notices-pr-alt.pdf
NeedKarma
Jan 4, 2010, 11:30 AM
http://www.socialsecurity.gov/pressoffice/pr/corrected-notices-pr-alt.pdf
Good sleuthing! +1 Internet for you.
galveston
Jan 4, 2010, 02:19 PM
What I KNOW is that for nearly 10 years now, the payments have arrived Wed of the 3rd week. My birthday is the 21st, so that would be right.
Now it will come on Wed of the 4th week. Not a major problem for us, but if it IS inclusive, then the total amount is large.
Since the notice seemed to be generic, I supposed it was inclusive of all SS recipients. (I guess I probably threw the notice away.)
It DID say it was to correct a mistake on the 2010 notices that placed (my) date on the 20th of Jan.
If this is not all inclusive, then that is strange too.
parttime
Jan 4, 2010, 02:35 PM
Here's how it works:
Birth date on Benefits paid on
1st - 10th Second Wednesday
11th - 20th Third Wednesday
21st - 31st Fourth Wednesday
galveston
Jan 4, 2010, 02:52 PM
Here's how it works:
Birth date on Benefits paid on
1st - 10th Second Wednesday
11th - 20th Third Wednesday
21st - 31st Fourth Wednesday
Yeah, now!
For the first year since 2000 in my case.
Are you able to check this against last year?
parttime
Jan 4, 2010, 03:31 PM
I checked it with my records from April 04 and it's the same as I posted earlier.
tomder55
Jan 4, 2010, 05:37 PM
Was this sent to all recipients ?
twinkiedooter
Jan 4, 2010, 05:42 PM
Since my birthday is the 7th of the month I get my Old People's Lottery check on the second Wednesday. The formula has never changed since it was implemented a bazillion years ago. And you don't get a paper check anymore but a deposit into your bank account. This makes it impossible for any checks to be taken out of the mailbox or stolen from the maildeliveryperson's mail bag. They should have done that years ago.
I did not receive any such notification about the benefits being paid a week later. Apparently someone in Washington had a bad case of got bored and decided to scare the wits out of the 6 million old fogies they mailed it to.
twinkiedooter
Jan 4, 2010, 05:43 PM
was this sent to all recipients ?
No. Only to the 6 million folks they wanted to scare the crap out of.
galveston
Jan 4, 2010, 10:13 PM
Strange!
NeedKarma
Jan 5, 2010, 05:37 AM
Strange!Not really. Did you read the PDF?
tickle
Jan 5, 2010, 06:25 AM
NK, what is PDF?
Tick
NeedKarma
Jan 5, 2010, 07:01 AM
NK, what is PDF?
tickhttps://www.askmehelpdesk.com/2158411-post11.html
JudyKayTee
Jan 5, 2010, 07:38 AM
Now I'm confused - did the Notice say that the payment would be set BACK a week, causing people to (theoretically) lose money OR did it say "In the notice the payment date is incorrectly shown as one week before what the actual date of payment will be" which would appear to result in an early payment.
Or am I reading this wrong?
(Stepdaughter says she had no knowledge of any of this.)
twinkiedooter
Jan 5, 2010, 11:28 AM
The notice basically said that someone messed up sending out 6 million notifications about the SS payments being delayed a week. It was totally inaccurate info in the original notification about holding back a week.
And these are our government employees hard at work. Folks making stupid mistakes and cost time and money printing up retractions. What do they care, they have a job and to be "fired" from a government job takes an act of G*d or something similar to happen.
NeedKarma
Jan 5, 2010, 11:36 AM
So why don't you get a job at the government then?
tickle
Jan 5, 2010, 11:42 AM
https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/2158411-post11.html
Well, that helped an awful lot
Tick
NeedKarma
Jan 5, 2010, 11:44 AM
Sorry, is it that you don't know what a PDF-type document is at all?
speechlesstx
Jan 5, 2010, 11:50 AM
Here is the text of the .pdf (an Adobe document format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Document_Format)).
The Social Security Administration earlier this month mailed notices that contained incorrect January 2010 payment dates. These erroneous notices went to about 6 million beneficiaries who receive their payments on either the second, third, or fourth Wednesday of each month, and are part of the annual benefit notices that go to 52 million Social Security beneficiaries. In the notice the payment date is incorrectly shown as one week before what the actual date of payment will be. The other information in the notice, including the payment amount, is correct. Social Security is sending a letter explaining the error to beneficiaries who received the incorrect one as soon as possible.
“We apologize for the inconvenience and confusion these incorrect notices will cause,” said Michael J. Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security. “The problem was caused by an unfortunate human error. We are correcting the misinformation as quickly as possible, and we are reviewing our processes closely to prevent this type of mistake from happening in the future. People receiving Social Security benefits in January 2010 should know that their payment will arrive on the same payment day that it has arrived in the past.”
Hope that helps.
NeedKarma
Jan 5, 2010, 11:51 AM
Thanks speech.
Basically it's much ado about nothing.
speechlesstx
Jan 5, 2010, 12:00 PM
Agreed.
tickle
Jan 5, 2010, 12:14 PM
Sorry, is it that you don't know what a PDF-type document is at all?
Yes, I do NK, and I followed the links, got the PDF which included four documents, one is a Social Security Notice. Is that what I was supposed to find?? It didn't tell me much. Thanks anyway.
Just because I have a stupid looking greyhound sitting on a rock in my avvie and my screen name is tickle, doesn't necessariily mean I am challenged in any way. But at times I would prefer people to think that way, it disarms them.
Tick
NeedKarma
Jan 5, 2010, 12:22 PM
The PDF is only one page the contents of which speech copied in its entirety. I'm not sure what four documents you are referring to, sorry.
Depressed in MO
Jan 5, 2010, 01:26 PM
was this sent to all recipients ?
I received the same notice in the mail-in regards to my daughter's social secruity benefits. What I got out of it was that previously they had sent a letter stating when the payments would be processed in Jan. 2010-but the dates were incorrect. It was like a little post card thing.