“I want to apologize for any confusion or misunderstanding during the October hearing,” acting Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi wrote in a letter dated Dec. 11.

Kijakazi sent the letter days after KFF Health News and Cox Media Group reported that the agency has been demanding money back from more than 2 million people a year — more than twice as many as Kijakazi disclosed to a House panel at an Oct. 18 hearing.

The report was based on a Social Security document the news organizations obtained through a records request under the Freedom of Information Act.

“In my effort to be responsive to Committee questions on overpayment numbers, I provided a preliminary, unvetted and partial answer,” Kijakazi said in her apology letter.

“My goal — and SSA’s goal — is always to provide Congress with the most complete, accurate, and responsive information possible,” Kijakazi said. “We did not do that in this case and will use this experience to improve our communications with Congress going forward.”

In an interview before she sent the apology, Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) said Kijakazi “wasn’t being completely upfront” at the hearing, and he wondered whether the agency had “intentionally deflated the numbers.”

Meanwhile, in a Dec. 12 interview, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), said the agency had damaged its credibility by “not telling the truth.”

(WFXT-TV, Boston)

(WSB-TV, Atlanta)

The hearing of the House Ways and Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Social Security focused on the agency’s record of sending out billions of dollars of benefit payments that it later concludes it never should have paid — and then, sometimes years later, demanding the recipients pay the money back.

The unexpected bills, which can total tens of thousands of dollars or more, can be devastating for the recipients. Many are disabled and struggling to get by on minimal incomes.

Until the hearing, the agency had not disclosed the number of people affected, making it harder for policymakers to assess the seriousness of the problem and what to do about it.

At the hearing, Rep. Mike Carey (R-Ohio) asked how many people a year are receiving overpayment notices.

Reading from a piece of paper, Kijakazi gave two precise numbers: 1,028,389 for the 2022 fiscal year and 986,912 for the 2023 fiscal year.

Under further questioning, she repeated the numbers.

She also said they were “under Social Security” and “for Social Security.”

After the hearing, KFF Health News and Cox Media Group sent the Social Security press office several emails over a period of weeks asking for clarification: Did the numbers Kijakazi gave at the hearing represent all programs administered by the Social Security Administration, or just a subset?

SSA spokesperson Nicole Tiggemann did not give a direct answer.

The news organizations filed the FOIA request for a copy of the document from which Kijakazi read the numbers at the hearing.

The document showed that Kijakazi did not tell House members the whole story.

She read numbers that included two benefit programs, but she repeatedly omitted numbers for a third program her agency administers under the Social Security Act. The numbers she omitted were bigger than the numbers she disclosed, and, on the piece of paper, they appeared directly below the numbers she disclosed.

She left out more than a million people a year.

More than seven weeks passed before she sent Congress the apology.

(WSOC-TV, Charlotte)

(WFTV-TV, Orlando)

“We should have followed up with additional context following the hearing,” she said in her letter. “I take seriously the commitment that all Federal officials make to provide the Congress with accurate information and I very much regret not contacting you with more information right away.”

KFF Health News and Cox Media Group obtained a copy of the letter addressed to Rep. Drew Ferguson (R-Ga.), chair of the Ways and Means’ Subcommittee on Social Security, and a copy sent to a Democratic member of the committee.

Asked which members of Congress were sent the letter, Tiggemann said in an email, “The correspondence was between Acting Commissioner Kijakazi and members of the committee.”

Tiggemann did not respond to a request for an interview with Kijakazi.

In her letter, Kijakazi essentially disavowed the numbers she gave the committee. She said the agency is trying to make sure it has “the right data to make meaningful improvements.”

“We are committed to sharing this data with the Committee and the public,” she wrote, “as soon as it is fully vetted.”

Addressing overpayment problems — and communicating with Congress about them — will soon be someone else’s responsibility.

The evening of Dec. 18, the Senate voted 50 to 11 to confirm former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) as commissioner of Social Security.

At his confirmation hearing in November, O’Malley said he would “absolutely prioritize” reducing overpayments and overhauling the appeals process for people asked to repay money.

“It’s been heartbreaking reading some of these stories” of people who face government collection efforts “through no fault of their own” and “without regard” for their circumstances, O’Malley said.

“We have to do a better job of recognizing the justice at stake in each of these individual cases,” O’Malley, a former presidential candidate, said at the hearing.

O’Malley said he would emphasize improving customer service, measuring results, and disclosing data.

Instead of hoarding information, he said, “you need to share information openly and transparently.”

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

The Social Security Administration assured lawmakers in the past that it had been addressed, but “what you all found in your reporting is that the problem hadn’t been fixed,” Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in an interview.

Wyden was referring to an ongoing investigation by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group television stations reporting how the agency has been issuing billions of dollars in overpayments — benefits it claims people never should have received — and then, sometimes years later, demanding they pay the money back.

“Millions of these individuals are walking an economic tightrope, balancing their food bill against the fuel bill, the fuel bill against the rent bill,” Wyden said. “And they have one of these overpayments and it just hits them like a wrecking ball.”

Meanwhile, congressional legislation that would raise asset limits for millions of Social Security recipients for the first time in decades has been gaining support.

The amounts the agency alleges people owe the government often total tens of thousands of dollars. The recipients include many of the nation’s most vulnerable — people who are disabled and have minimal savings and incomes. Often the overpayments result from errors or lapses on the part of the Social Security Administration.

The agency has been sending overpayment notices to more than 2 million people a year, according to a government document KFF Health News and CMG obtained through a request under the Freedom of Information Act. The notices typically ask recipients to repay the government within 30 days. They also explain how to appeal or request that the government waive the debt.

The Finance Committee oversees Social Security. Wyden spoke with KFF Health News and CMG on Dec. 12 in his first interview with the news organizations since they began reporting on Social Security overpayments and clawbacks months ago. He was elaborating on a statement the committee posted last week.

“As the point person for getting this fixed, I’m committing to getting this turned around,” Wyden said.

“Your reporting has just been invaluable in terms of kind of opening up a lot of visibility and awareness to something that needs to be fixed.”

Wyden is co-sponsor of a Senate bill that would address one of the root causes of overpayments.

(WSB-TV, Atlanta)

In the Supplemental Security Income program, which provides monthly checks to people who have little or no income or assets and are over 65 or disabled, asset limits for beneficiaries haven’t been adjusted since the 1980s. Those limits stand at $2,000 for individuals and $3,000 for couples.

The bill, spearheaded by Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.), would raise the asset limits to $10,000 and $20,000, respectively, and adjust them for inflation in the future.

The bill has seven other co-sponsors in the Senate, including recent additions Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), chair of the Appropriations Committee.

Chief executives of several major Wall Street firms, including Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley, expressed support for the bill at a recent hearing, CNBC reported.

At a September news conference on Capitol Hill, a representative of JPMorgan Chase, which also backs the proposal, said the asset limits often prevent employees from participating in a 401(k) retirement plan to which the firm makes matching contributions.

A parallel bill in the House of Representatives has 10 lawmakers behind it.

“With growing bipartisan support in Congress and among the business and faith communities, we have a good chance to finally get this done,” Brown said in a statement for this article.

Legislation to raise the asset limits could be included in a government funding bill early next year, Brown spokesperson Kevin Donohoe said.

Wyden said he hopes the legislation becomes a campaign issue in the election year and that candidates are asked whether they support it.

The monthly meetings with the Social Security Administration will begin when a new commissioner is in place, Wyden said. President Joe Biden’s nominee to head the agency, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D), cleared the Finance Committee and is awaiting a confirmation vote by the full Senate.

In a recent hearing, O’Malley said accounts of people facing clawbacks were “heartbreaking” and promised to make the issue a priority.

Wyden said he expects the oversight meetings will include the top Republican on the Finance Committee, Sen. Mike Crapo of Idaho.

A spokesperson for Crapo, Mandi Critchfield, said he “is committed to addressing the overpayments issue, and looks forward to working with Senator Wyden to conduct proper oversight.”

One of the goals for those meetings, Wyden said, is to find out whether the agency can do more about overpayments using the legal powers it already has, including the authority to waive debts.

Wyden said he has discussed Social Security overpayments and clawbacks with officials at the White House.

In the interview, Wyden also addressed a recent report by KFF Health News and CMG that, according to the results of a public records request, the SSA has been sending overpayment notices to over a million more people a year than the agency’s acting commissioner, Kilolo Kijakazi, disclosed at an October House hearing.

“When you have Social Security officials not telling the truth — and that’s how I would characterize that report on the number of people for whom there was actually a problem — it really damages this incredibly important program’s credibility,” Wyden said.

The news organizations obtained a copy of a piece of paper from which Kijakazi read aloud some numbers but not others at the October hearing.

SSA spokesperson Nicole Tiggemann said last week the agency could not confirm the accuracy of the counts — those Kijakazi presented at the hearing and those she left out.

Meanwhile, senior Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee issued a statement this week calling for action on overpayments and clawbacks.

“Recent news reports have highlighted that the harm and unfairness Social Security beneficiaries experience after unknowingly being overpaid is more widespread than previously thought,” Reps. John B. Larson of Connecticut and Danny K. Davis of Illinois said.

Larson is the ranking Democrat on the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security, and Davis is the ranking Democrat on the Subcommittee on Work and Welfare.

“The need for action is clear,” they said. “There must be a fundamental overhaul of Social Security’s overpayment process – one that puts seniors and Americans with severe disabilities first.”

While the government is at fault for some overpayments, others result from beneficiaries failing to comply with requirements, intentionally or otherwise. That can include failing to keep the SSA updated about items such as earnings, assets, and in-kind support — for example, whether family members are giving the beneficiary food or a place to stay.

Systemic problems also contribute.

The SSA has relied on manual systems, and those are subject to human error.

Rules are complex and difficult for SSA staff and beneficiaries alike to follow.

People who receive federal disability benefits yet try to work can easily run afoul of restrictions not only on how much they are allowed to save but also on how much they are allowed to earn. For individuals who aren’t blind, the monthly limit is $1,470.

The SSA relies heavily on beneficiaries to report changes in income, assets, and the like. For instance, the agency has been slow to implement systems that would automatically tap payroll data from outside sources.

Beneficiaries and advocates for Social Security recipients say the agency frequently loses information they submit. Getting through to humans at the agency can be extremely difficult, they say. Wait times are long, and calls get dropped.

O’Malley, the nominee for commissioner, recently told the Senate Finance Committee that the agency has a “customer service crisis.”

“The current wait times, backlogs, and delays are simply unacceptable,” O’Malley wrote.

The agency has cited staffing and funding. In the 2023 fiscal year, “we began to rebuild our workforce after ending FY 2022 with the lowest staffing level in 25 years,” the acting commissioner said in an October statement to a congressional subcommittee.

The agency closed field offices during the pandemic. That made it more difficult for beneficiaries to communicate with the SSA, and it caused problems to pile up.

The agency checks benefits retrospectively, which leaves it playing catch-up, researchers at the Urban Institute have said.

Regardless of who was originally at fault, by the time the SSA issues an overpayment notice, years can pass and the alleged overpayment total can balloon.

Under federal law, the agency must try to recover overpaid amounts, Kijakazi said in her October statement, and there is no statute of limitations. To collect debts, the SSA can reach back decades and across generations.

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

That’s according to a document KFF Health News and Cox Media Group obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.

Acting Commissioner of the Social Security Administration Kilolo Kijakazi read aloud from the document during the hearing but repeatedly left out an entire category of beneficiaries displayed on the paper as well.

The document indicates the fallout from Social Security overpayments and clawbacks is much wider than Kijakazi acknowledged under direct questioning from a House Ways and Means subcommittee that oversees the federal agency.

In a statement for this article, SSA spokesperson Nicole Tiggemann described the numbers of people Kijakazi provided in her testimony and those she left out as “unverified.”

“We cannot confirm the accuracy of the information, and we have informed the committee,” Tiggemann said.

The numbers “were gathered quickly,” the spokesperson said. Social Security systems “were not designed to easily determine this information,” she said.

After the October hearing, KFF Health News and Cox Media Group sent Tiggemann several emails asking her to clarify whether the annual numbers Kijakazi gave to Congress included all Social Security programs or just a subset. She would not say.

For answers, the news organizations several weeks ago filed a FOIA request.

Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.), a member of the subcommittee, said in an interview that he wondered if the agency “intentionally deflated the numbers to not make it look as bad as it is.”

“Maybe we should have her come back in for another hearing, put her under oath,” and ask her “why she wasn’t being completely upfront about the numbers,” Steube said.

Steube said that, when he heard Kijakazi’s testimony, he thought she was giving the subcommittee the complete numbers.

At issue is the scope of a problem that has terrified many Social Security beneficiaries and plunged them into financial distress.

As KFF Health News and Cox Media Group television stations jointly reported in September, the government has been trying to recover billions of dollars from beneficiaries it says it overpaid. In many cases, the overpayments were the government’s fault.

But, even in cases where the beneficiary failed to comply with requirements, years can pass before the government catches the mistake and sends a notice demanding repayment, often within 30 days. In the meantime, the amount the beneficiary owes the government can grow to tens of thousands of dollars or more — far more than people living month to month could likely repay.

The people affected may be retired, disabled, or struggling to get by on only minimal income.

The number of people experiencing overpayments is important to know because overpayments can cause a lot of harm, said Kathleen Romig of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, who worked in research at the Social Security Administration and has since spent 20 years in the field of Social Security policy.

“It should be a very high priority at the agency to produce more reliable numbers,” Romig said.

The Social Security Administration has long quantified overpayments in dollars rather than numbers of people affected. For example, the agency’s latest annual financial report says it recovered more than $4.9 billion in overpayments in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 and ended that period with a cumulative uncollected overpayment balance of $23 billion.

In September, SSA’s Tiggemann said, “We do not report on the number of debtors.”

In subsequent interviews with the news organizations, some lawmakers said the agency owed the public that information. “If they’re not telling you, I can assure you that’s a question that I’m going to ask in a hearing,” said Rep. Mike Carey of Ohio, the No. 2 Republican on the subcommittee.

At an Oct. 18 hearing, Carey brought up the number of debtors and told Kijakazi, “I think it’s something that we really need to get to the bottom of.”

Then he asked, “Do we have a number of how many people have been impacted by these overpayments?”

“We do,” Kijakazi replied. “And I’m, I looked at that before I came. I’m, I’m sorry. I’m not thinking of the number right now. But I can provide that.”

Carey pressed further.

“How many people are receiving overpayment notices in a year?” he asked.

At that point, Tom Klouda, a deputy SSA commissioner, got up from his seat behind Kijakazi and handed her a piece of paper.

Reading from the page, she gave two precise numbers: 1,028,389 for the 2022 fiscal year and 986,912 for the 2023 fiscal year.

When Carey asked if 986,912 “individuals were getting these letters in the mail saying that there was an overpayment and that they needed to contact you guys and set up a payment plan,” Kijakazi said, “That’s right.”

“Seems like an awful lot,” Carey said.

Under further questioning from Carey, Kijakazi repeated the numbers. She said they were “under Social Security” and “for Social Security.”

Subsequently, the agency declined to clarify what Kijakazi meant by that. Replying to a series of emails, Tiggemann would not say whether the numbers included all the Social Security programs.

Instead, she implied the agency didn’t know.

(WFTV, Orlando)

(KIRO-TV, Seattle)

“Again, our overpayment systems were not designed to easily determine the information you’re requesting,” she wrote on Nov. 29.

The document obtained via FOIA shows that the numbers Kijakazi gave at the hearing covered only two of the three Social Security benefit programs. They did not cover Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, which provides financial support for people who have little or no income or assets and are blind, otherwise disabled, or at least 65 years old.

On the paper that the deputy commissioner handed Kijakazi, overpayment counts for SSI appeared directly below the numbers she read aloud, and they were bigger: 1,118,648 people in fiscal 2022 and 1,189,642 in fiscal 2023.

The document is titled in part, “Overpayment Basic Facts.”

In the document, the numbers Kijakazi read at the hearing, which round to about 1 million people a year, are labeled “T2.” Title II of the Social Security Act covers two programs: Disability Insurance, or DI, and Old-Age and Survivors Insurance, or OASI.

The numbers Kijakazi omitted are labeled “T16.” Title XVI of the Social Security Act covers SSI.

Within the Social Security Administration, personnel use the term T16 when referring to SSI and T2 when referring to OASI and DI combined, said Romig, the former agency researcher.

It’s possible that some people who received overpayment notices through SSI also received notices through the other programs, leading to overlap between the numbers Kijakazi read at the hearing and those she didn’t provide, Romig said.

In the 2023 fiscal year, the agency paid SSI benefits to an average of 7.5 million recipients a month. Measured in dollars, the overpayment rate in SSI has been running about 8%, according to the agency’s latest annual financial report. That’s much higher than the half a percent overpayment rate for OASI and DI combined.

A written statement Kijakazi submitted to the House subcommittee included a clue that the numbers of people she gave the committee didn’t provide a complete picture. In the statement, dated Oct. 18, Kijakazi used the term “the Social Security program itself” to describe Disability Insurance and Old-Age and Survivors Insurance — but not SSI.

A press release the Ways and Means Committee issued after the hearing made no such distinction. “One Million Americans a Year Affected by Social Security’s Improper Payment Highlights Need for Reform,” it said.

(WPXI-TV, Pittsburgh)

(WHIO-TV, Dayton)

The document obtained via FOIA included other new information. It showed that relatively few beneficiaries contest overpayment notices and that many appeals or requests for waivers fail.

Weeks after KFF Health News and CMG television stations published and broadcast the first stories in their series, the Social Security chief ordered a review of overpayments.

In her statement Dec. 5, the agency spokesperson said that, as part of the review, the Social Security Administration is “looking at how best to inform the Agency, the public, and Congress about this workload.”

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

Two members of a Senate panel that oversees Social Security sent a letter to the agency’s acting commissioner, Kilolo Kijakazi, urging her to do more to prevent overpayments and “limit harm to vulnerable beneficiaries” when trying to recover the money.

As KFF Health News and Cox Media Group television stations jointly reported in September, the Social Security Administration routinely sends notices to beneficiaries saying they received benefits to which they weren’t entitled — and demanding they pay the government back, often within 30 days.

(WFXT-TV, Boston)

In the 2022 federal fiscal year, for example, the agency sent overpayment notices to more than 1 million people, Kijakazi told Congress in mid-October.

Alleged overpayments can continue for years before the government notifies a recipient and seeks repayment. By then, the amount a beneficiary allegedly owes the government can reach tens of thousands of dollars or more. People living check to check likely would have spent the money.

To recoup money owed, the government can reduce or stop people’s monthly benefit checks.

“[W]e have been deeply concerned by stories from our constituents and recent reports of the extreme financial hardship placed upon beneficiaries who are asked to quickly repay in full or whose payments are halted, reduced, or reclaimed as the agency attempts to correct improper payments, many of which occurred due to agency error,” Sens. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.) wrote in a Nov. 28 letter to Kijakazi.

Citing the news organizations’ reporting, the senators asked what Kijakazi is doing to prevent harm to beneficiaries and what Congress can do.

Hassan and Cassidy are on the Senate Finance Committee’s Subcommittee on Social Security, Pensions, and Family Policy.

Meanwhile, Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) sent Kijakazi a letter on Nov. 17 calling the agency’s actions “unacceptable.”

“If anyone intentionally defrauded the system or lied to receive payments at other taxpayers’ expense, they should absolutely be held accountable and repay this debt to taxpayers,” Scott wrote. “But it’s completely wrong for the federal government to go after well-intentioned Americans who did all the right things and trusted that their government was doing the right thing, too.”

Many of the people affected are disabled, low-income, or both and are enrolled in the Social Security Administration’s Disability Insurance or Supplemental Security Income programs.

In the 2022 fiscal year, the agency issued an estimated $4.6 billion in SSI overpayments, which represented 8% of payments in that program, according to the agency’s latest annual financial report.

Kijakazi recently told a House subcommittee the 8% was “a small percentage.”

In other programs administered by the agency, there were an estimated $6.5 billion in overpayments in fiscal 2022, which amounted to one-half of 1%. Kijakazi called that overpayment rate “extremely low.”

During the 2023 fiscal year, which ended on Sept. 30, the agency recovered $4.9 billion in overpayments, according to a recent statement by Social Security’s inspector general. At the end of that period, an additional $23 billion of accumulated overpayments remained uncollected, the statement said.

Since KFF Health News and Cox Media Group TV stations published and broadcast news reports on overpayment clawbacks in September, several members of the House and Senate have written to the Social Security Administration calling for change or answers.

“Many of these overpayment notices come as a complete surprise to SSA beneficiaries, leaving them confused, shocked, and scared that they cannot pay what SSA says they owe,” Rep. Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat and Senate candidate, said in a Sept. 29 letter. “And, because of an indefinite ‘look-back period’, SSA can collect funds from a recipient for an error going back decades,” he added.

Asked about the latest letters from lawmakers, Social Security spokesperson Nicole Tiggemann said the agency “will respond directly to the requestors.”

Kijakazi said in October that she ordered a “top-to-bottom” review of how the agency handles overpayments.

Under federal law, the agency must seek recovery of overpaid amounts unless circumstances warrant waiving the debts, Kijakazi said in recent testimony to Congress. There’s no time limit on efforts to collect the debts, she said.

In their letter to the acting commissioner, Cassidy and Hassan asked what the agency is doing to make it less burdensome for beneficiaries to appeal or seek a waiver when an overpayment is the government’s fault.

In response to questions for this article, Tiggemann, the Social Security spokesperson, said, “We will examine our policies and procedures — including our regulations — to determine where administrative updates to the overpayment recovery and waiver process may reduce the complexity and burden for the people we serve.”

Scott, the Florida Republican, asked if the review Kijakazi announced in October would be disclosed to the public. In a written response to questions for this article, the Social Security spokesperson didn’t say.

Samantha Manning of CMG’s Washington news bureau contributed to this report.

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

As of Oct. 1, the SSA had an uncollected balance of $23 billion in overpayments — money the agency had determined it mistakenly paid to beneficiaries across the country but had not been able to claw back, despite repeated attempts to do so.

In September, a series of investigative reports by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group television stations first revealed the magnitude of the problem and shared the experiences of dozens of people who’ve received letters from the federal agency demanding repayment, sometimes in the tens of thousands of dollars. At the beginning of fiscal year 2023, the agency’s uncollected balance of overpayments was $21.6 billion.

Its latest “Agency Financial Report” also revealed that the SSA made approximately $11.1 billion in new overpayments to beneficiaries during federal fiscal year 2022, the most recent year of data available. That figure represents more than a 65% increase from overpayments made the previous year. For the past several years, the agency routinely distributed between $6 billion and $7 billion in new overpayments each year.

The report shows the majority of the 2022 overpayments occurred within the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) programs, an estimated $6.5 billion. Those programs provide retirement and survivors’ benefits to qualified workers and their families, or support workers who become disabled and their families.

In prior years, most of the overpayments occurred within the Supplemental Security Income program, which provides financial support to aged, blind, and disabled adults and children who have limited income and resources. In 2022, overpayments within the SSI program topped $4.6 billion, which is similar to previous years.

The SSA had not yet responded to a request for an explanation of the significant increase in overpayments within OASDI.

(WHIO-TV)

The report said $1.6 billion of the OASDI overpayments and $287 million of the SSI overpayments were within the agency’s control, meaning they weren’t the beneficiaries’ fault.

In recent weeks, beneficiaries have told KFF Health News-Cox Media Group TV reporters they had no idea they were receiving too much money in their monthly checks until they received a letter from Social Security demanding repayment, often within 30 days.

“I almost threw up when I opened that letter,” said Lori, a Florida woman who didn’t want to publicly disclose her last name. She received a notice saying she owed $121,000, a debt she said was later erased following a multiyear fight with the SSA.

The notices often arrive years after the alleged overpayments occur and, by that time, the money owed can balloon to dollar amounts impossible for beneficiaries to repay.

“It’s just scary to my husband and me. Where are we supposed to come up with this money?” Ohio resident Tammy Eichler told WHIO-TV.

When beneficiaries can’t repay the money, the agency may lower their monthly benefit checks, even when the overpayments were the government’s fault. 

“Taking that benefit away from me will make me homeless,” Florida resident Jesse Greatorex told WFTV-TV.

SSA spokesperson Nicole Tiggemann said the SSA is required by law to attempt to recover overpayments once they are detected.

“We will be doing a top-to-bottom review to see how we can further reduce the error rate,” said SSA acting Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi, who directed an agency-wide review of overpayment policies and procedures following the reporting by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group TV stations in September.

Members of the Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee held a hearing in October, citing the joint reporting and demanding answers from Kijakazi regarding the number of people affected by overpayments and what the agency plans to do to address the problem.

A group of senators also wrote to Kijakazi asking about overpayments caused by government-issued stimulus checks during the covid-19 pandemic. KFF Health News and Cox Media Group TV stations profiled beneficiaries who believe the agency erroneously counted those payments against their asset limit, in violation of SSA policy.

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and other members of Congress are considering several legislative changes that could make it easier for people to avoid overpayments: for example, raising the cap on how much money they’re allowed to save.

“I want [the legislation] to fix the people that it’s already happened to. I want it to stop it from happening in the future,” Brown told WHIO-TV.

Ohio resident Addie Arnold, who cares for her disabled niece and received a letter saying they owed the government more than $60,000, wrote to the SSA saying, “I truly do hope and pray that she is allowed to stay on SSI … because she has to continue to live and without it, she will be in a very bad place.”

“Social Security should be to help people, not to destroy them,” Arnold said.

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

At his confirmation hearing on Thursday, Democratic former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley said he would “absolutely prioritize” reducing overpayments and improving the appeals process for millions of people asked to repay money, often years later.

At least seven senators identified overpayments as a key concern during hours of questioning at Thursday’s hearing and asked O’Malley about how he would address the issue. Several committee members have cited joint investigations by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group television stations, which reported the scope of the overpayment problem; how retired, disabled, and low-income beneficiaries have been affected; and the broad range of issues that can cause overpayments.

“It’s been heartbreaking reading some of these stories” of people who face government collection efforts “through no fault of their own” and “without regard” for their circumstances, O’Malley said.

“I am deeply concerned about the burden placed on individuals when the Social Security Administration works to recoup payments that the agency made because of its own errors,” Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) told O’Malley. “We have constituents who are reaching out all the time to share that they’re struggling to make ends meet because SSA has unexpectedly and drastically reduced their benefits.”

Beneficiaries routinely receive demands for repayment long after they have spent the money.

Many of the overpayments are the result of beneficiaries’ failure to comply with federal requirements. But others are the result of errors by the Social Security Administration. Complex, hard-to-follow rules contribute to the problem. And beneficiaries often struggle to respond to overpayment notices because they have trouble reaching Social Security employees by phone.

“We need to correct that,” said Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.), who raised the issue during the hearing.

O’Malley added that Social Security’s attempts to claw back overpayments that were the result of covid relief payments were “an outrage,” and he pledged to correct it.

The agency frequently overpays people for months or years before catching the mistake. By then the amount to repay can balloon into tens of thousands of dollars. To recoup alleged overpayments, the Social Security Administration often reduces or suspends beneficiaries’ monthly benefits.

“We have to do a better job of recognizing the justice at stake in each of these individual cases,” O’Malley said.

Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) told of a severely disabled constituent who is unable to work, lives with her parents, and pays them half of her benefits from the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program each month as rent. The constituent was recently notified that she owes the government more than $9,000, Wyden said, because she still received a rental subsidy from her parents.

Wyden said he and other senators have proposed legislation “to friggin’ simplify the program and reduce these overpayments.”

Under questioning by Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), O’Malley agreed that limits on the amount of assets beneficiaries are allowed to hold are root causes of overpayments. The limits, which haven’t been increased for inflation since the 1980s, stand at $2,000 for individuals and $3,000 for couples.

“It’s a leading cause and it’s a huge administrative burden,” O’Malley said.

Legislation proposed by Brown and others to raise the asset limits “would absolutely not only be the right thing to do for the recipients, the right policy,” O’Malley said, “but would also reduce the huge administrative burden that Social Security has to go through.”

Samantha Manning of CMG’s Washington news bureau contributed to this report.

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

The lawmakers, who include Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), sent a letter to acting SSA Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi on Wednesday saying they were “deeply concerned” and wanted answers to a list of questions within 30 days.

In 2020 and 2021, to counter the economic fallout of the covid pandemic, the government distributed relief payments to eligible Americans totaling as much as $3,200 per person. The payments typically arrived automatically in mailboxes or bank accounts.

But, as KFF Health News and Cox Media Group reported this week, some recipients say the payments had an unintended consequence: They led the Social Security Administration to claw back other federal benefits, including monthly support payments for people who are poor and either disabled or at least 65.

(WHIO-TV, Dayton)

The covid relief, known as stimulus or economic impact payments, left some recipients with more money in the bank than the $2,000 asset limit for individuals receiving benefits through a Social Security program called Supplemental Security Income. As a result, the Social Security Administration has sent some people notices alleging they were overpaid and demanding they repay the government, according to people affected.

In some cases, the agency has cut off SSI payments.

That wasn’t supposed to happen. According to the agency’s rules, the covid payments, also known as EIPs, do not count toward the asset limit.

“[W]e are concerned by recent reporting that SSI beneficiaries have received overpayment notices because of the EIPs, even though SSA determined that EIPs would never be counted toward eligibility for SSI,” the senators wrote to Kijakazi.

The letter cited the news report by CMG and KFF Health News.

Signing along with Wyden were Democrats Sherrod Brown of Ohio, who chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Social Security, Pensions, and Family Policy, and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, a member of that subcommittee and chair of the Senate Special Committee on Aging.

“We sent it because … it’s not right that Social Security made a mistake, and the beneficiary shouldn’t have to pay for that mistake,” Brown said Thursday in an interview with CMG’s WHIO-TV in Dayton.

“We’re not going to drop this until they back off,” Brown said, referring to the agency.

The senators asked Kijakazi about the scope of the problem, including the number of people who had benefits reduced or suspended because of covid payments, the number who had benefits reinstated with or without an appeal, and the outcomes of appeals. They also asked what the agency has been doing about the issue.

“As you know, SSI benefits, while modest, have a substantial impact in the lives of the people who rely on them,” the senators wrote. “Benefit suspensions and overpayment notices — regardless of the cause — can have a profound negative impact in their lives.”

“Further,” they wrote, “losing SSI eligibility risks a lengthy and bureaucratic process to restore eligibility and also risks beneficiaries’ access to Medicaid coverage.”

Nicole Tiggemann, a spokesperson for the Social Security Administration, did not respond to a request for comment.

The covid-related Social Security clawbacks are part of a larger picture. As KFF Health News and CMG reported last month, many Americans have been struggling with demands that they repay benefits the Social Security Administration says they never should have received. The collection efforts can cover years of payments and reach tens of thousands of dollars or more.

In some cases, the alleged overpayments are the result of beneficiaries failing to comply with requirements. In others, they are the result of errors by the government.

The same day the senators sent their letter to Kijakazi, the agency chief was being questioned on overpayments at a hearing convened by a House panel.

Kijakazi revealed that about 1 million people have received overpayment notices from the agency in each of the last two fiscal years.

She told the panel that Social Security employees “work assiduously to pay the right person the right amount at the right time,” and that the agency was conducting a “top-to-bottom” review of its handling of overpayments.

“If we determine that a beneficiary has been paid more than they should have received, we are required by law to seek recovery of the overpayment amounts,” Kijakazi testified during the hearing.

Solving the larger problem may require legislation, Brown said, adding he would try to change the law this year “if that’s what’s necessary to get Social Security to do it right.”

John Bedell of CMG’s WHIO-TV in Dayton, Ohio, contributed to this report.

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

Kilolo Kijakazi, the acting commissioner, testified at a congressional hearing at which House members faulted the agency for issuing billions of dollars of payments in error and then, often much later, demanding that beneficiaries pay the money back.

“Ordinary citizens are being punished for a government failure,” said Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.), citing a recent investigation by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group.

(WSB-TV, Atlanta)

Many of the people facing clawbacks are poor and disabled.

“Imagine living paycheck to paycheck with no savings as a result of an injury preventing you from working again and receiving a message from the federal government saying you owe them tens of thousands of dollars because of the government’s mistake, not your mistake,” Steube said.

Kijakazi said Social Security employees “work assiduously to pay the right person the right amount at the right time.”

Asked who at the agency was being held accountable for overpayment mistakes by the agency, Kijakazi said, “We are holding ourselves accountable.”

The agency had previously declined to say how many people were affected by overpayments.

At the hearing, in response to a question from Rep. Mike Carey (R-Ohio), Kijakazi said 1,028,389 people were sent overpayment notices in the 2022 fiscal year and 986,912 in fiscal 2023.

“Seems like an awful lot,” Carey said, adding that it helps explain why congressional offices are getting inundated with calls from constituents asking for help with overpayments.

The hearing by the Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee was held in the wake of joint investigative reports by CMG and KFF Health News spotlighting the trauma many poor, disabled, and retired people experience when the government demands they repay benefits they have long since spent.

In many cases, years pass before the Social Security Administration determines someone has been overpaid and tries to recoup the money. In the meantime, the amount involved can balloon into tens of thousands of dollars or more.

Related Links

• Covid Relief Payments Triggered Feds to Demand Money Back From Social Security Recipients
• Social Security Chief Orders Broad Review of Benefit Overpayments 
• Social Security Overpays Billions to People, Many on Disability. Then It Demands the Money Back.

The agency announced this month it was appointing a team to review its handling of overpayments.

At the hearing, Kijakazi said the review would examine causes of overpayments, the notices it sends beneficiaries — which have been criticized as both confusing and missing important information — and how to make the process more efficient.

Kijakazi said the agency recently simplified the form beneficiaries must complete to ask that a demand for repayment be waived.

The chair of the subcommittee, Rep. Drew Ferguson (R-Ga.), said the new form is “still really complicated, and we’re putting a tremendous burden on the beneficiary.”

Kijakazi and Democrats on the panel said the agency needs more funding to do a better job and accused Republicans of trying to underfund it.

Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-Calif.) said “years of underfunding has severely eroded the Social Security Administration’s customer service.”

Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.) called the hearing a “smokescreen.”

“It serves as a cover-up for an extremist agenda to gut Social Security,” Pascrell said.

Republicans argued that the agency has been too slow to automate its work, such as collecting information on how much beneficiaries are paid or whether they receive workers’ compensation. Both can affect benefits administered by the Social Security Administration.

Kijakazi was asked when certain automation projects would be completed but did not say. She said she would follow up.

The agency estimated that, in the 2021 fiscal year, it overpaid people by $6 billion and underpaid people by $1.4 billion, according to a November report by the agency’s inspector general.

The agency ended the 2022 fiscal year with a cumulative total of $21.6 billion in overpayments uncollected, the report said.

At the hearing, lawmakers noted that beneficiaries are also harmed by underpayments.

For instance, a September report by the agency’s inspector general estimated that the agency did not issue timely payments totaling about $308 million to adults responsible for managing the benefits of about 50,000 children.

For more than 20 years, the agency’s inspector general, an internal watchdog, “has identified improper payments as a major management challenge,” said Tonya Eickman, an official in the IG’s office.

Overpayments can result when beneficiaries don’t keep the agency updated on their financial information, such as how much they are earning, how much support they get from others in the form of food and housing, and the value of their assets.

But many overpayments are caused by mistakes on the part of the Social Security Administration, the agency has reported.

After the CMG-KFF Health News investigation, Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-N.Y.) said the agency should “immediately stop seeking back overpayments.”

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), chair of a Senate panel that oversees Social Security, called on the agency to stop penalizing people who have been overpaid for years.

The Social Security Administration has wide latitude to waive overpayments or allow people to repay in installments. It also has an obligation not to waste taxpayer money and to recover payments to which people weren’t entitled.

The witnesses invited to testify at Wednesday’s hearing didn’t include anyone personally affected by an overpayment notice.

However, in interviews with KFF Health News and CMG, people have said the experience can be devastating. They have also said trying to work with the agency to resolve problems can be exasperating. They have said it can be hard to get through by phone and that the agency loses material they submit and have described getting different answers from different people.

Justina Worrell, who has a heart condition, an intellectual disability, and cerebral palsy, received a notice that she was overpaid more than $60,000. Worrell, who works part time as a kitchen helper in a nursing home, has no way of repaying that amount, her aunt and caregiver Addie Arnold said.

Matt Cooper, who was shot in the face while working as a police officer, was called upon to repay $30,000. In the meantime, the government reduced his children’s benefits. Cooper’s wife, Kristen, said the agency failed to correctly account for his workers’ compensation.

Julia Greune, who is blind and has cerebral palsy, was called on to repay more than $6,000. Her father, Dave Greune, said that was because the Social Security Administration improperly counted the $3,200 in covid-19 relief payments the government automatically deposited in her bank account toward the $2,000 asset limit for people receiving Supplemental Security Income benefits.

Though Dave Greune has appealed, the agency cut off Julia’s monthly benefits, he said.

Like other people who say they were sandbagged by covid stimulus payments, the Greunes’ problem was that, instead of immediately spending the money, they saved it — in Julia’s case, to buy a wheelchair.

But some recipients say the covid relief payments have triggered financial distress by jeopardizing their Social Security benefits.

The government has demanded they repay much larger amounts — thousands of dollars in benefits for the poor and disabled distributed by the Social Security Administration.

“The government gave this money to them with one hand. They should not be trying to take it back with the other,” said Jen Burdick, an attorney at Community Legal Services of Philadelphia who has helped many people contest repayment demands.

Jo Vaughn, a disabled 63-year-old in New Mexico, received $3,200 in federal covid relief. Then came a letter from the Social Security Administration dated Aug. 25, 2023, saying she owed the government $14,026.

“They are sending me to a very early grave,” Vaughn said.

The covid clawbacks show the trauma the Social Security Administration can cause when it claims to have overpaid beneficiaries, many of them highly vulnerable, then calls on them to pay the money back.

And the collection efforts illustrate the limitations and dysfunction that have come to define the agency.

Social Security Administration spokesperson Nicole Tiggemann declined to comment for this article or to arrange an interview with the agency’s acting commissioner, Kilolo Kijakazi.

(WHIO-TV, Dayton)

(WSOC-TV, Charlotte)

In the wake of a recent investigation by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group, House and Senate members have called for action on problems at the Social Security Administration. The agency has announced that it is undertaking a review of its own, and a House panel is scheduled to hold a hearing on Oct. 18.

Vaughn and other recipients didn’t ask for the covid money. The checks, known as economic impact or stimulus payments, landed automatically in their mailboxes or bank accounts in three installments in 2020 and 2021. The payments, which were based on the recipient’s income, totaled as much as $3,200 per person.

The payments pushed some beneficiaries’ bank balances above the $2,000 asset limit for individuals on Supplemental Security Income (SSI), a program for people with little or no income or assets who are blind, disabled, or 65 or over. The limit, which hasn’t been adjusted for inflation in decades, can discourage people from working or saving more than a perilously small amount of money.

In some cases, when the Social Security Administration belatedly noticed the higher bank balances, it concluded the beneficiaries no longer qualified for SSI, according to people affected. Then the agency set out to recapture years of SSI benefits it alleged they shouldn’t have received.

Even as recipients appealed the actions, the agency stopped sending monthly benefit checks.

The ripple effects can disrupt health care, too. In most states, receiving SSI makes someone eligible for Medicaid, so halting SSI benefits can jeopardize coverage under the public health insurance program, said Darcy Milburn of The Arc, an organization that advocates for people with disabilities.

Vaughn, who suffered a disabling injury while working as a cook at a truck stop, said she depends on the $557 she was receiving from SSI each month. It hasn’t come since August, she said.

Her only remaining income, she said, is $377 in monthly Social Security retirement payments.

“I’m afraid of being homeless,” she said by phone. “I don’t want to end up on the street.”

Or even worse, she said in an email: “If I don’t start receiving my money back, well let’s just say I have my will ready.”

Actions Defy Agency’s Own Policy

The covid stimulus payments aren’t supposed to trigger Social Security clawbacks.

Early in the pandemic, the Social Security Administration said that, when assessing people’s eligibility for SSI, it would exclude the payments for 12 months. Later, it said it would exclude them indefinitely.

But what the agency says and what it does — indeed, what it is capable of doing — are often very different, people who study the agency said.

“It’s not clear SSA knows where money in beneficiaries’ accounts is coming from,” said Kathleen Romig, director of Social Security and disability policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

“As far as we can tell, SSA simply doesn’t have the tools to implement a permanent exclusion from the resource limit,” Romig said.

The number of people who have received Social Security clawback notices due to covid relief payments is unclear.

What’s more, beneficiaries might not realize stimulus payments could be at the root of alleged overpayments. As a result, they may be ill-equipped to challenge any clawbacks.

(WFXT, Boston)

(WFTV, Orlando)

“A lot of people have been caught up in inaccurate or improper” overpayment notices “because of stimulus money,” said Burdick, the legal aid attorney in Philadelphia. She estimated that her office alone had seen about a hundred such cases.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), chair of the Senate Finance Committee, asked the Social Security Administration in September 2021 how many people had their SSI payments reduced or cut off on account of the stimulus payments. In its written response, the agency didn’t say.

At the time, Wyden said the agency’s decision to indefinitely exclude stimulus payments from the asset limit “may have come too late for many struggling families.”

The Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities, an umbrella group for advocacy organizations, flagged the problem as early as May 2021. In a letter to the Finance Committee, the group said it was concerned that some people would have their benefits reduced “in order to recover overpayments that never should have been assessed.”

Vaughn said she saved her covid stimulus funds to leave herself some money to fall back on.

When the Social Security Administration told her she had been over the asset limit for more than two years, the agency didn’t mention the stimulus payments. But Vaughn reviewed her bank records and concluded the covid payments were the cause.

Lost in the System

Dave Greune of North Carolina said that, in the case of his disabled 43-year-old daughter, Julia, the cause of an overpayment notice was clear.

The reason her assets exceeded the limit, Greune said, was that $3,200 in stimulus payments had been deposited directly into her bank account by the same government now demanding she repay almost twice that amount.

How does he know?

The only funds that flowed into Julia’s account were her SSI payments and the covid stimulus payments, Greune said.

In April 2023, two years after Julia’s last stimulus payment, the agency notified Greune that it had been overpaying her since September 2020.

First it said she owed $7,374.72. Later, it revised that to $6,253.38.

Julia is blind with cerebral palsy and a mental disability, Greune said, leaving her “totally disabled.” The family was saving the stimulus money to buy her a new wheelchair, he said.

In correspondence, the agency pointed to checking account balances as the basis for its finding that Julia exceeded the $2,000 asset limit. It noted that the agency doesn’t count the value of a home, one vehicle, or “a burial fund of up to $1,500.” But it didn’t alert Greune that, according to its own policy, covid stimulus payments shouldn’t count toward the limit. He figured that out himself.

Greune said he immediately filed an appeal online.

In July, at the direction of an agency representative, he drove 45 minutes to a Social Security office in Raleigh and delivered a stack of bank statements and an appeal form.

Greune, 64 and retired from a career in real estate, logged many unsuccessful efforts to follow up by phone. Left on hold for 15 minutes until the call dropped. Left on hold for 46 minutes until the call dropped.

Ultimately, he said, he reached a person who told him she saw no record of the agency having received the appeal he filed online — or the documents he delivered by hand.

In the meantime, Social Security stopped sending Julia’s monthly benefits. The last payment, of $609.34, arrived six months ago, he said.

Late last month, the county government sent Julia a notice that, because the Social Security Administration was stopping her SSI checks, the county was reviewing her eligibility for Medicaid.

“And if we don’t have Medicaid that’s going to be a big problem,” Greune said. “Now I’m really pissed off.”

‘Angst, Lots of It’

In early 2021, about a year after the first economic impact payments, known as EIPs, were distributed, the Social Security Administration issued what it called an “Emergency Message.”

It instructed staff on how to handle the payments and contained information that could have been useful to SSI beneficiaries.

“Develop and exclude the EIP from resources” — in other words, assets — “only when an individual alleges receiving and retaining an amount that may affect eligibility,” it said.

It also told staff to take beneficiaries at their word. “Accept the individual’s allegation,” it said.

Martin Helmer of Denver, 77, said that, when the Social Security Administration made a mistake involving his son’s benefits, the burden fell on him to speak up.

He said he felt he was treated as guilty until proven innocent.

“It was angst, lots of it,” Helmer said, “especially when I saw how hard-ass they were being about everything.”

Helmer manages the benefits for his 40-year-old son, Quinn, who has a mental illness. In July, the Social Security Administration sent a letter alleging in part that, since May 2021, Quinn had received more than $17,000 for which he was ineligible.

Going forward, the agency said, it would reduce his benefits.

Helmer concluded that the main issue was the covid stimulus payments; other than Social Security benefits, that was the only money that flowed into Quinn’s account, he said.

Helmer, a retired auditor and IRS agent, spent several days studying an agency manual. He contested the agency’s action and won.

He worries how other people would fare — and how his son would manage without him.

“I think disabled people and their caretakers have maybe less energy than the average person to deal with something like this,” he said, “when they’re already dealing with a lot.”

Madison Carter of WSOC-TV in Charlotte, North Carolina, contributed to this report.

Do you have an experience with Social Security overpayments you’d like to share? Click here to contact our reporting team.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

The announcement signals that members of Congress are focusing on the trauma many poor, retired, and disabled people have experienced from the government trying to reclaim safety-net payments — some in the tens of thousands of dollars — it says they shouldn’t have received.

The hearing comes in the wake of an investigation by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group (CMG) that found that, by the time the government catches a mistake and demands repayment, years may have passed and, often, the beneficiary has already spent the money to cover basic living expenses.

The House Ways and Means Committee’s subcommittee on Social Security is scheduled to hold the hearing on Oct. 18.

The hearing will examine “how the Social Security Administration can better identify improper payments before they occur and provide beneficiaries with adequate notice when they occur,” the chairmen of the two panels, Reps. Jason Smith (R-Mo.) and Drew Ferguson (R-Ga.), said in a brief announcement.

The announcement did not say who would be testifying.

A media contact for the Ways and Means Committee did not respond to a request for more information.

Since KFF Health News and CMG published and broadcast their initial reports in September, some members of the House and Senate have expressed outrage about the overpayments — and the government’s efforts to recover them. At least two lawmakers have called on the Social Security Administration to stop trying to get the money back from beneficiaries.

The No. 2 Republican on the Social Security subcommittee, Rep. Mike Carey (R-Ohio), recently called for a hearing.

He said in an interview the general sense from members is, “We do have a problem, we’ve got to address it, we’ve got to fix it.”

Last week, the Social Security Administration’s acting commissioner, Kilolo Kijakazi, said she was assembling a team to review the agency’s “overpayment policies and procedures.” The agency has declined to say how many people it has demanded repayments from. Some members of Congress have said the agency should disclose that information, and questions about it could come up at the hearing.

Overpayments result from beneficiaries failing to comply with requirements, whether innocently or intentionally, or from lapses or errors on the part of the Social Security Administration. In recent years, the agency has been issuing between $6 billion and $7 billion annually in new overpayments, according to government reports.

The agency has said that, when overpayments occur, it is required to try to recoup the money. However, it has the power to waive debts if the beneficiary wasn’t at fault and, for instance, if the recipient can’t afford to repay the government.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, formerly known as Kaiser Health News (KHN), a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism.