Social Security Announces Expedited Retroactive Payments and Higher Monthly Benefits for Millions – Actions Support the Social Security Fairness Act
Reading Time: 2 MinutesLast Updated: April 18, 2025
Today, the Social Security Administration announced it is immediately beginning to pay retroactive benefits and will increase monthly benefit payments to people whose benefits have been affected by the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and Government Pension Offset (GPO).
These provisions reduced or eliminated the Social Security benefits for over 3.2 million people who receive a pension based on work that was not covered by Social Security (a “non-covered pension”) because they did not pay Social Security taxes.
The Social Security Fairness Act ends WEP and GPO.
“Social Security’s aggressive schedule to start issuing retroactive payments in February and increase monthly benefit payments beginning in April supports President Trump’s priority to implement the Social Security Fairness Act as quickly as possible,” said Lee Dudek, Acting Commissioner of Social Security. “The agency’s original estimate of taking a year or more now will only apply to complex cases that cannot be processed by automation. The American people deserve to get their due benefits as quickly as possible.”
People who will benefit from the new law include some teachers, firefighters, and police officers in many states; federal employees covered by the Civil Service Retirement System; and people whose work had been covered by a foreign social security system.
Many beneficiaries will be due a retroactive payment because the WEP and GPO offset no longer apply as of January 2024. Most people will receive their one-time retroactive payment by the end of March, which will be deposited into their bank account on record with Social Security.
Many of these people will also receive higher monthly benefits, which will first be reflected in the benefit payment they receive in April. Depending on factors such as the type of Social Security benefit received and the amount of the person’s pension, the change in payment amount will vary from person to person.
Anyone whose monthly benefit is adjusted, or who will get a retroactive payment, will receive a mailed notice from Social Security explaining the benefit change or retroactive payment. Most people will receive their retroactive payment two to three weeks before they receive their notice in the mail, because the President understands how important it is to pay people what they are due right away. Social Security is expediting payments using automation and will continue to handle many complex cases that must be done manually, on an individual case-by-case basis. Those complex cases will take additional time to update the beneficiary record and pay the correct benefits.
Social Security urges beneficiaries to wait until April to ask about the status of their retroactive payment, since these payments will process incrementally into March. Since the new monthly payment amount will begin with the April payment, beneficiaries should wait until after receiving their April payment, before contacting Social Security with questions about their monthly benefit amount.
Visit the agency’s Social Security Fairness Act webpage to learn more and stay up to date on its progress. Visitors can subscribe to be alerted when the webpage is updated.
Did you find this Information helpful?
Tags: Social Security benefits
See CommentsAbout the Author
Social Security Administration
Social Security Administration
Comments
Comments are closed.
teresa l.
Love what our Great President is doing for the USA. My question is, My husband passed and his SS pay is where? To me that also should come to the widow as well as the widows SS. It is as if his SS floated out to space. We both worked very hard in our life time and paid in to SS not to have that benefit as well.
rosalind l.
Will we have to pay taxes on this money?
Tom M.
Yes. Plan ahead so that you won’t be shocked when that 1099 comes next year.
Alice G.
The SS Administration has declared this money will not be taxed.
Herbert D.
Now we have social security welfare. It gets my gourd that people who had not paid into this system will get benefits. Our government is ridiculous. It’s time to privatize Social Security.
Anita J.
I worked for an Electricians Union for 20 years and am penalized and paying taxes on half my Social Security because of it. Why am I being penalized when electricians are an essential part of everyday living?
Diane
I started to work for the post office at age 30. Didn’t pay into social security. In my teens and 20’s worked and paid into it. At age 60 (30 years in the post office ) and didn’t pay into social security. At that time I had 35 credits for social security from working in my 20’s. You need 40 credits to get ANY social security. So I needed 5 more credits. I went back to work at a gym to get those 5 credits. Because of my pension from the post office they gave me , social security gave me only 1/3 of my social security. That’s fine, it was the law. Biden signed it into law Jan 5th after congress passed it.
Trump was all in for it also. I will be getting my full social security starting in April.
Tommy W.
Thank you for everything you’ve been doing for us the American people. God bless and Godspeed.
Donna M.
I worked for the United States Postal Service for 15 years as a Federal Employee are we entitled to receive the retroactive payments also?
Dave
Why are there people drawing Social Security that have never paid in to it ?
LAlvarez
These people my husband included also worked other jobs that they paid into the social security system which enable them to draw a social security check! Unfortunately for years these individuals were penalized for having a career that had private pensions and did not pay into SS. So please don’t place judgment on these individuals without understanding what the Social Security Fairness Act is all about.
Linda M.
You should realize that these people who are receiving this long delayed adjustment have paid into SS – some, like me, have worked and paid into SS for many more years than the shorter period of time at an agency from which we also paid into a pension fund and received a pension based on that work record.
We have been penalized by having our SS benefits reduced by subtracting as much as 2/3 of the amount of the private pension from our SS benefits for 20 years or more.
We earned both, at different periods of our employment history.
This adjustment does not come close to the cumulative loss we have suffered, some for decades.
Carlene H.
My question exactly… their take home pay would be more than not having to have SS taken out of their pay checks…
Not fair.
I had heard that people who were in BOTH SS and a pension plan had their SS amount reduced… because they were in both…
not sure if this is true. This is also not fair… I had NO CHOICE but to be in both plans and for 30 years had to contribute therefore I should get full benefits based on salary and contribution.
Nick P.
In order to qualify for Social Security, a person must have worked for at least 40/4 during their lifetime that usually the equivalent of 10 years they did not have to be continuous and could have been working a couple of years then taking on another occupation or owning a business and then later in life working five or six more years where Social Security was deducted from their checks. I don’t think that you’re going to find anyone receiving a full Social Security check or even a partial one that did not ever have any money taken out of their paycheck for Social Security.
Nicole
And why are they not helping the disabled on ssd 😞 we can’t work and can’t survive on the little amount we get
Robin B.
Hi Dave,
I paid into Social Security in full but I also had worked in the UK and received a pension from the UK based on my UK earnings. When I claimed my retirement benefits in the USA having made all of the necessary payments into the system, my monthly check was reduced by 40% because of this WEP rule. My UK pension that I receive is way smaller than the 40% reduction that this rule imposed on me but that was the rule and I and others suffered financially as a result. This rule has now been abolished because it is unfair to reduce the retirement payments to people who have actually paid in full.
Deborah D.
Dave…WE DID PAY IN!! These are all people who worked multiple jobs, we got all of our quarters, and yet, because we also had a pension from one of those jobs, our SS has been reduced by approximately 40%!!
John D.
This is not what is happening. The people who are getting this did pay SS taxes when they worked for covered employment and have enough periods of coverage, usually 40 calendar quarters. When they retired from the non-covered employment their SS benefit was reduced through a pretty complicated formula/algorithm. Now they will get a full benefit based on their contributions. Mine was reduced about 45% when I started my CSRS retirement. My benefit was derived from Military active duty and Reserve service plus some other odd times of SS covered employment over more than a 30 year period. I never thought it unfair to me, but there are those out there who are hurt by the reduction more than I.
John D.
This is not what is happening. The people who are getting this did pay SS taxes when they worked for covered employment and have enough periods of coverage, usually 40 quarters. When they retired from the non-covered employment their SS benefit was reduced through a pretty complicated formula/algorithm. Now they will get a full benefit based on their contributions. Mine was reduced about 55% when I started my CSRS retirement. My benefit was derived from Military active duty and Reserve service plus some other odd times of SS covered employment over more than a 30 year period.
Frank D.
Thanks to the Fairness Act, I received a deposit in my bank account yesterday representing my back Social Security increase for last year. It annoys me that several people I have spoken to, who were never affected by WEP, have felt personally cheated, rather than happy for me. My payment is not a handout, but an adjustment to get me to where I should have been all along. This is about fairness, not greed. I can never make up the approximately $20,000 that I should have received from 2019, after I retired, until the end of 2023. At least the 2024 amount was adjusted retroactively. Thank you to all at the Social Security who worked hard to get me what I am entitled to.
Tim N.
is the monthly amount permanent?
Kim
I haven’t even received a letter yet! I need my retro!
Howard L.
Hey Frank,
I’m in the same boat… Postal Retiree, in my case under the Civil Service Retirement System… and thereby affected by the WEP provision… I got a deposit in my checking account this morning of nearly $4k, and had no idea why.
Steve G.
Amen. I, personally am elated for you to finally receive the benefit you and many others earned & fully qualify for. You or no one else receive benefits for earnings that were not assessed by Social Security. SS could explain what I just stated & how other income people have earned that was never SS assessed, did not negatively impacted their benefit.
Steve G.
Amen. I, personally am elated for you to finally receive the benefit you and many others earned & fully qualify for. You or no one else receive benefits for earnings that were not assessed by Social Security. SS could explain what I just stated & how other income people have earned that was never SS assessed, did not negatively impacted their benefit.
Denise L.
How about people that worked for the school district but wasn’t a teacher
Patricia F.
It would depend on the facts: Did you pay into a state retirement fund? If you did and were subject to the WEP and did not work in the private sector for 40 quarters or more you will not get SSI. If you did not pay into the state or public retirement system and you paid 40 quarters into Social security, you will get the SSI.
Alice J.
Did you pay into SS while you worked for your School District? Or just into Teacher Retirement? Or did you pay the required quarters into SS while working at other jobs?
Deborah B.
I was a paraprofessional for 30 years! Am I entitled to this S.S. Adjustment?
C.B.
Hi, Deborah. Thanks for reading our blog. For information to help determine if you are eligible, please visit our Social Security Fairness Act webpage. We hope this helps.
Shirley S.
Will only teachers and firefighter get this increase?
Before I worked for the federal government, I worked in. The private
Sector will we get this increase.
C.B.
Hi, Shirley. Thanks for reading our blog and for your question. Only people who receive a pension based on work not covered by Social Security may see benefit increases. If you had a non-covered pension from your work as a federal employee covered by the Civil Service Retirement System, you may receive back benefits and an increase on your own Social Security benefit. For more information, visit our Social Security Fairness Act webpage. We hope this helps.