Reporting Changes is Your Responsibility
Reading Time: 2 MinutesLast Updated: November 6, 2023
If you receive benefits from Social Security, you have a legal obligation to report changes, which could affect your eligibility for disability, retirement, and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits. You must report any changes that may affect your benefits immediately, and no later than 10 days after the end of the month in which the change occurred.
Changes you need to report range from a change of address to traveling outside the United States for 30 consecutive days. To get a list of reporting responsibilities under disability, please read our publication, What You Need to Know When You get Social Security Disability Benefits, and for SSI, read What You Need to Know When You Get Supplemental Security Income. If you’re receiving retirement benefits, What You Need to Know When You Get Retirement or Survivors Benefits is also helpful.
Life changes can affect your benefits. You may be due additional payments, or you may be overpaid and have to pay us back because you didn’t report the overpayment in a timely manner. The SSI program may apply a penalty that will reduce your benefits if you fail to report a change, or if you reported the change later than 10 days after the end of the month in which the change occurred. If you fail to report changes in a timely way, or if you intentionally make a false statement, we may stop your SSI, disability, and retirement benefits. We may also impose a sanction against your payments. The first sanction is a loss of payments for six months. Subsequent sanctions are for 12 and 24 months.
You can report your change online, or by calling toll free at 1-800-772-1213. If you’re deaf or hearing-impaired call TTY 1-800-325-0778. Mail the information to your local Social Security office or in person if you prefer. If you receive SSI, you should ask about our options to use the automated toll-free SSI Telephone Wage Reporting Service or the free SSA Mobile Wage Reporting app.
If you receive benefits and need to change your address or direct deposit, you can conveniently do so by creating a personal my Social Security account.
Get the right check, in the right amount, at the right time, by reporting changes right away!
Did you find this Information helpful?
Tags: retirement benefits, SSI, supplemental security income, survivors benefits
See CommentsAbout the Author
Doug Walker, Deputy Commissioner, Communications
Deputy Commissioner, Office of Communications
Comments
Comments are closed.
Dudley H.
My 51 year old son with Multiple Sclerosis entered a nursing home a few months ago. We used his Social Security Disability check to pay the nursing home and he got to keep $35 a month.
I just received notice that his disability checks would end.
The nursing home said Medicaid would pay them for their costs but that he would no longer receive any money for personal expenses.
Is this correct? Why do his disability payments end?
R.F.
For security reasons, we do not have access to personal records via this blog. Please contact your local office for further assistance. If you are unable to visit your local servicing office, you may call our toll free number at 1-800-772-1213, representatives are available Monday through Friday between 7:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. Generally, you will have a shorter wait time if you call later in the week. Thanks.
Nancey
I keep getting statements for the former owner of the home I bought. I have sent the statements back to SSA for months trying to get them to stop sending them to this address….how do I get them to stop?
R.F.
We apologize for any inconvenience Nancey. You can try returning the letters to the local Social Security office and address the issue with the office manager. Please let him or her know that you’ve reported this same issue to us in the past. You can call our toll free number at 1-800-772-1213 for assistance. Representatives are available Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. We appreciate your understanding and assistance in this matter.
Robert w.
Hi I been living with my mom for the past 6 months I’m only 16 yrs old and my dad keeps saying he’s going to switch over the money to my moms name but he’s not doing it and if I report him what will happen to his fiancé she’s from the Philippines and is not a citizen yet what will happen to her if my mom reports him to the ssi in Las Vegas nv
R.F.
Thank you for contacting us Robert. Most children under the age of 18 require a Representative Payee. Generally, we select a parent or a family member living in the same household to manage their benefits. The most important duty of a representative payee is to know your needs and to use the benefits in your best interests. A beneficiary’s change of residence should be reported as soon as possible. We recommend that you and your mother visit the local Social Security office and speak to one of our representatives to see if a change of payee is needed. Thanks.
Louis
Where exactly does one go on the SSA web site to submit a notification of change in non-covered pension? The “Message Center” has no function for creating messages. There’s an Inbox, but no Outbox. Please give us a link or a series of steps to follow to create a message.
R.F.
Hi Louis. Since we do not have access to personal information, we do not do direct messaging in this venue. In your situation, we recommend that you contact your local Social Security office and provide us with documents that best support the change in your “non-covered” pension. If you have specific questions, please call our toll-free number at 1-800-772-1213. Representatives are available between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m., Monday through Friday, but you will generally have a shorter wait time if you call later in the week. Thanks!
Jonathan G.
10 business days before they can update my mailing address?
I still have not recieved my SSI for october my rents late and everything.
My payee called 3 times once in Early September the call center representative said it was taken care of. Then I found out Sept 30th it was not updated so my payee called again that following Wednesday it still was not updated. So my payee called again and they told her that it takes 10 business days.
You guys suck!
Tom
Yeah, they suck almost as hard as the taxpayers that are funding your lifestyle.
Whitney G.
My daughter was receiving ssi disability but she no longer have it. does that mean she lost her medicaid as well because i have doctors appointments coming up and she cant miss those.
Angie
My daughter’s ss benefits are due to expire on her birthday this month, (her biological mother died). I have have not turned in forms to continue benefits past 18 (I plan on taking them to the ss office on Monday). Will benefits continue after I turn in the forms?
R.F.
Hi Angie! Normally, benefits for children stop when children reach age 18 unless they are disabled. However, if the child is still a full-time student at a secondary (or elementary) school at age 18, benefits will continue until the child graduates or until two months after the child becomes age 19, whichever is first. We hope that you already turned in the forms to your local office. To follow up or for further assistance, please call our toll free telephone number at 1-800-772-1213, Monday to Friday, between 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Merriam W.
I was the Durable Power of Attorney and am now the Executor for both my mother and father. My father, passed on May 31, 2015. He was an Honorably Discharged/Disabled American Veteran. He had been wounded in the line of duty and carried a bullet in his body until his date of death. My father provided very well for my mother and myself. He was definitely our hero. I do not understand why his memory would be tarnished with the unruly actions of the Social Security Administration against his wife; my mother!
In September 2015, my mother received a letter stating her benefits would be stopped until SSA found out what was going on. Several calls were placed in September 2015 and October 2015, to SSA to find out what the issue may have been and to ensure that all of the necessary documents were sent in on our behalf and that she had been receiving the benefited amount SSA had determined for her to receive (along with the surviving spouse allotment). We were assured that it was an error on the part of SSA and everything was being taken care of in a hurried manner. However, my mother did not receive any further correspondence from SSA in October 2015.
Therefore, in November 2015, I placed another call to the (800) number for SSA and was told that I was being placed on a list for someone to call us from a local office to contact us for an appointment. Someone called 2 days later for an appointment the following week. At our visit to an assigned local office in Detroit, MI, we were told that my mother had been declared DECEASED. How could this be? SSA was not contacted with a death certificate for my mother, so why would they simply assume that she was deceased? We went back in December 2015 and January 2016 to see if SSA was doing what they were supposed to be doing in order to get my mother’s Social Security benefits reinstated, because her being declared as deceased meant her Medicare and Social Security benefits were cut off from everything she had; such as Health, Medical, Dental and Eye Insurance, Prescriptions, and even Secretary of State.
My mother’s Social Security Benefits have not been in existence since August 2015. She had NO INCOME coming in at all!!!! While at the SSA office (in November 2015), she and I both wrote out statements as proof of her being alive, copies of her driver’s license were taken, as well as the unmerited fact that she was personally sitting in the office in front of them. All of this has done nothing to speed up the process that SSA has truly screwed up! No one knows or even cares about my mother’s livelihood! They don’t care if she is ALIVE, well, eating, is able to pay her bills, or anything!!!!
My mother was supposed to also receive my father’s Veterans Administration Pension for Surviving Spouse benefits and had not received this either, because she had been declared deceased by SSA. She had to report the income she was receiving, but unfortunately, she WAS NOT RECEIVING ANY INCOME and was forced to report $0. So, VA denied her request and she did not receive this benefit, either. She cannot go to the doctor, because she has NO MEDICARE and the Medicare portion of her Blue Cross was involuntarily canceled. She cannot get her prescriptions either because of SSA and their screw up. Why didn’t someone notify us of all of this before it got so out of hand?! My mother is 82 years old, uses a walker and is now, a widow. She should not have to endure the things that she has had to endure for a year. I hope everyone involved understands that my mother may be 82 years old, but she is still in her right mind and knows that something isn’t right with what is going on. She speaks for herself and did not need a guardian or anyone to speak for her at that time.
I, personally, am even more shocked and upset with the fact that SSA helped themselves to $3,696 from my mother’s checking account (on which I am a listed account holder) that they DID NOT deposit. In other words, THEY STOLE MONEY out of our account and still have not returned it. This is money that was not put in the account in any form of Governmental SSA direct deposit that needed to be withdrawn. This was money that was simply TAKEN without our knowledge or for any reason. I have our bank records to prove it! All checks that were deposited by SSA were returned at the hand of withdrawals by SSA dipping in-and-out of our checking account and they have all been accounted for!
So, why in November 2015, would SSA withdraw 4 consecutive amounts of $1,391, $1,391, $457, $457, all on the same day? However, SSA DID NOT deposit any of these payments into the checking account, nor were any of these amounts supposed to be withdrawn from the account. Remember, SSA had not made any deposits into the checking account since August 2015 and they had ALREADY WITHDRAWN all of the amounts that they feel they deposited in error. All erroneous deposits and returns (withdrawals) had been accounted for, but my mother’s $3,696 HAS NOT BEEN RETURNED, YET!
I contacted our bank to see what happened. Mind you, the bank never contacted us about all of the strange activity going on in our account, either. We had a contract with the bank to flag and notify us of any suspicious activity in our account, but the bank dropped the ball, too. The Bank stated to us that if that money is not returned by SSA, we should get a lawyer to have it retrieved. Needless to say, the bank was wrong and appeared to be working right along with SSA in destroying my mother’s life.
In the second week of January 2016, I sent in a report to SSA’s Office of Inspector General for an investigation to be performed, but have yet to hear from them. I sent in another report in March 2016 and still NOTHING! Sent in requests for help from Attorney General’s office, attorneys, media, etc., still nothing. Not even any responses back.
On February 3, 2016, we suddenly received a document from SSA stating my mother would receive $12,187 for payment through December 2015. It also stated that, in February, she would receive $1391 for January 2016. So, many questions still remain. (1) Is the amount she is to receive from SSA through December 2015 correct? (I do not trust SSA and their figuring with regard to my mother’s benefits). (2) Where is the check for February 2016 and when is she to receive that? She is still owed a check for February, too. (3) What about the money SSA withdrew from her account that did not belong to SSA? (4) And, where is the $12,187, because she has NOT received that yet, either? (5) Has her Medicare been reinstated back to where it was before SSA messed it up? (6) If not, when will it be?
I feel that SSA has presented itself as being fraudulent and abusive to my elderly mother. She has not been able to receive her benefits; medical, dental, and eye care services, because of the ridiculousness that SSA has placed her in and her health and well-being is being compromised. That is elderly abuse. I am sure that with all of the worry she was going through with how she was being treated and how her money was depleting and being stolen from her bank account that this was making her sick. And, she needs to go to her doctors, to the dentist, and get her new glasses.
It is strange to me, and this is why I say there is some fraudulent activity, is when SSA has the audacity to send my mother four (4) – 2015 Tax Statements for her to file taxes with when she has not received any benefits since August 2015; and the total for all add up to her receiving over $19,000 and my father receiving over $12,000 (as he passed away in May 2015). How would my father receive $12,000 from SSA if he only received $1,391 for five months? That doesn’t even add up right! How is any of this supposed to be considered right? She DID NOT and still HAS NOT received any of this money that they say she did on these tax forms. Also, how could she be taxed for money she has not even received; as well as my father? If she did not receive this money in 2015, then why would she be taxed for it? I do not feel comfortable turning this information in to have her taxes prepared. I don’t want her or myself to go to jail, because the SSA does not know what they are doing.
2016—————————–
It is now 2016. Unfortunately, my mother was admitted to the hospital and was later placed in ICU. It was imperative that I check on her benefits. I called the SSA (800) number and was told that SSA checks were being deposited since March 2016, but the bank had been returning them. So, I called the bank and ended up having to go, again, in person along with the letter from SSA stating they placed an erroneous death status on my mother and that they were working on fixing things. SSA was supposed to have sent this letter to the bank themselves, but I found out they had not; nor did they lift the “deceased” status they placed on my mother’s account. The bank would not accept the letter, the “durable power of attorney”, or her “will” from me and suggested I go to a different SSA office for a rubber stamp to be placed on the letter. I thought to myself….Really???!!! Why are there so many lies, deception, passing the buck, and downright disrespect for human life and well-being???!!!!!
I had to leave my mother’s side briefly to go to a different SSA office and when I got there, they would not accept my “durable power of attorney” or her “will” and were more concerned with why the bank sent me to them. I was told that I could not receive any information regarding my mother’s account unless I was listed as her “guardian” or “representative payee” on her account. This was not in place before, because I was always with my mother and always had the legal documents required for them to be able to talk to me, too. I went there to speak to them about our checking account and the money they took out and had not replaced. SSA informed me they could not talk with me (even though my name is on the checking account, too). They told me they would need a statement from the ICU doctor to prove my mother was unable to speak for herself. What kind of stuff is this???!!!!! This is unbelievable!!! I cannot win.
No one is even realizing that this did not begin with my mother…it began from the incompetence of the Social Security Administration and the Bank! My mother was TOTALLY innocent and unknowing in all of this. It is as if they are determined to sweep their mess up under the rug while I continue to suffer with no answers and no money to pay my mother’s bills (that I am responsible for paying as executor) as well as my own financial responsibilities! It seemed really strange to me how they would accept all the information I had to provide, but could not talk to me about my checking account and where my money is they took out. It was alright for me to give them information, but they couldn’t do the same for me. Wow!
My mother passed away May 2016. She had still not received any form of payment from January – May 2016; not to mention any retroactive payments from September – December 2015. A letter was received from SSA stating they will be making a payment to my mother starting July 2016. Why? I had reported to them, the first of June 2016 that she had passed away. What’s really going on with them? I don’t understand why they continued to send written correspondence stating what my mother is to receive and she not receive it. So, I am even more screwed, because my mother is now deceased and I don’t have the funds that should be in the account to pay her bills, incoming medical bills, and her property taxes, etc., because the accounts have been exhausted.
I don’t have $1500 as a retainer for a lawyer who is actually willing to take on my case. Other lawyers do not even want to take the case, because it is for Social Security Benefits and not Disability or SSI. Why is everyone afraid of the government? It is disheartening to know that the elderly, and anyone else for that matter, who have worked and struggled much of their lives still cannot catch a break by getting what they worked so hard for even in the end.
Isn’t it enough that I have lost both my mother and my father?!!!! I am still trying to get Social Security to fix their mistake, even now. I have attempted again to contact the media to try to get a voice for my mother, but they won’t help either, because many of them do not believe that this actually happened and others didn’t find it newsworthy. Really???!!! Mistakes and wrongdoing on behalf of a government agency is not newsworthy?!!!! But how many “likes” they have on Facebook is?
I am on the verge of losing my house, my car, my parent’s home….EVERYTHING!!! My next step is BANKRUPTCY and being HOMELESS! And, WHY?!!! This is no one’s fault but Social Security!!! They claim to have so many accounts that they will get to it when they can. HOW IS THAT FAIR??!! Why did my mother, now myself, have to suffer from THEIR MISTAKES???!!! Why should we have to wait any longer for them to fix a mistake that should NEVER HAVE HAPPENED in the first place and should have been fixed a year ago while my mother was still living??!!!
Looks like they have screwed up so bad they don’t know how to fix it. It has been one whole year and 4 months and I have not received a phone call, a letter, a check….NOTHING from Social Security. It is as if they are still ignoring the issue. Never have we had bills late, credit scores plummet, think of filing for bankruptcy, or fear being put out of homes we have struggled to call our own, until NOW. It is a constant waiting game…where I have to suffer losing everything, because now they continue to take their sweet time in fixing THEIR mistake. I am tired of getting the run around! No one is doing anything!!!! And, they definitely are NOT DOING THEIR JOB!!!! Just stringing me along; all while I suffer to try to keep my head above water and pay bills I don’t have the money to pay for, because now my bank account is depleting and constantly experiencing NSF notices, overdraw fees, return check fees, and now facing a CLOSED account with a bank we have been with for over 30 years.
Is there any help or justice anywhere? Because I can truly see that the government can get away with ANYTHING and it is truly NOT FAIR!!!!
R.F.
Please accept our condolences Merriam; we are very sorry for your loss. We apologize for the inconveniences this situation has caused, and we certainly understand your frustration. We have referred your complaint to our Operations staff, asking them to investigate this matter and to take corrective action as necessary. We appreciate your feedback and thank you for bringing this to our attention.
kevin
If my spouse starts her SS benefit, based on her income, and I continue working, will her benefit be reduced because I make over 60,000 per year?
R.F.
Thank you for your question Kevin. Your wages will not affect your wife’s Retirement Benefits. To see how her own work activity can affect her Social Security benefits see our Retirement Planner: Getting Benefits While Working.
Tara W.
I have recieved no notice in the mail about any change in my ssi benefits. Is it possible my online account on the SSA website showing the wrong information?
R.F.
Hi Tara, please call our toll-free number at 1-800-772-1213, for assistance in your case. Representatives are available between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m., Monday through Friday but you will generally have a shorter wait time if you call later in the day, or later in the week. Thanks!