The Social Security Administration (SSA), the federal agency that administers Social Security payments, announced that it’s reforming how it recovers overpayment of benefits after receiving backlash over policies that cause financial strain for vulnerable and older Americans when the agency demanded abrupt repayment.
Reports such as those by “60 Minutes” and KFF Health News indicate that the SSA has been overpaying billions of dollars to beneficiaries, many of them on disability, and then causing harm to them by abruptly halting benefit checks to recoup the money it sent in error rather than offering them reasonable repayment terms.
While the law requires the SSA to recover overpaid benefits, the agency would sometimes dock people’s entire monthly Social Security payment, or send surprise demands that they pay back tens of thousands of dollars within 30 days, leaving some people financially destitute or even driving them into homelessness….
