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Oct 1, 2008

New Administrative Waiver Limit

Social Security typically waives Supplemental Security Income (SSI) overpayments when the claimant requests waiver and the amount of the overpayment is below a certain amount. These are called "administrative" waivers since Social Security believes that the cost of pursuing the overpayment is more than the amount of money involved. The limit had been $500. It was just raised to $1,000 on September 27, 2008.

There are a couple of caveats. The claimant must request waiver. The Social Security field office can decide not to give an administrative waiver if they really think the claimant is a bad actor. What Social Security calls "double check negotiation" (DCN) overpayments are never supposed to be waived. A DCN happens when the claimant reports that his or her monthly check never arrived. Social Security tells the Treasury to issue a replacement check. The claimant then cashes the original check plus the replacement check. That can happen by accident because the claimant is confused, but there are plenty of cases where the same claimant does this repeatedly or where a rash of DCNs happen in one area.

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