From a newly added section of Social Security's Program Operations Manual Series (POMS):
A Non-Entitled Debtor (NED) is a person or entity that owes a debt to the Social Security Administration (SSA) but is not entitled to Social Security benefits or Supplemental Security Income payments. Consequently, the NED does not have a Master Beneficiary Record (MBR) or a Supplemental Security Record (SSR) of his or her own....
In order to take appropriate actions, SSA’s automated debt collection systems have always interfaced with an MBR or SSR [databases of those entitled or potentially entitled to benefits] for the debtor. In cases where the debtor did not have a master beneficiary record, debt collection required manual control and efforts.
The purpose of the NED initiative is to create an automated system for controlling debts (both overpayments and incorrect payments) owed by people who do not have master beneficiary records. Therefore, SSA developed the capability within the Debt Management System (DMS) to identify, record, collect, and otherwise resolve debts owed by NEDs.
The NED database will record Overpayments and other debts in a series of releases to be determined in the future. Ultimately, the plans are to enable SSA to record and control debts owed by all types of NEDs. SSA intends to use all available, authorized debt collection methods to recover the debts ...
NED is often used on debtors who have abused someone as a payee and are asked to refund misused funds to a beneficiary.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if this is also about getting debts from people who, when they were kids, were overpaid on their parents' records (auxiliary beneficiaries, survivors). SSA has tried to do that for years. It's a challenge because Congress gets mad at them when there are overpayments they don't collect, but they get a lot of bad press when they try to go after someone who was overpaid from ages 7-9 and is now 43 years old--especially when SSA doesn't have much documentation about why they think there was an overpayment in the first place.
ReplyDelete@ 622 PM. I don't think so. There is an MBR for those kids to have the overpayment listed on.
ReplyDeleteAgreed that there was an MBR, but the numberholder for it in the now-grown-up kid cases is probably dead (their death may have been the reason for the entitlement in the first place).
ReplyDeleteSo the debt goes to the kid, who is not old enough for retirement benefits and not getting SSDI. They are "a person or entity that owes a debt to the Social Security Administration (SSA) but is not entitled to Social Security benefits or Supplemental Security Income payments. Consequently, the NED does not have a Master Beneficiary Record (MBR) or a Supplemental Security Record (SSR) of his or her own"
This is overdue for payee fraud. There was simply no way to collect from liable payees who didn't have an active SSID or MBR. No matter how agregious the payee misuse was. This is a good thing.
ReplyDelete