From a TV station in the San Francisco area:
It's a common mistake, but one that proved costly for a Danville man. You might say, this is a case in point -- a decimal point. ...
He sent in an online payment to Social Security for his Medicare B coverage for what he thought was for $1,695.60.
When he received verification of his payment, he discovered he put the decimal point in the wrong place.
The payment ended up being for $16,956."So I about freaked out. And obviously the numbers were right, but the decimal was put in the wrong place," he told us.
Russ called Wells Fargo, requesting a stop payment. The bank told him it couldn't do that.
"It was an electronic transfer, and not a check. That I'd have to contact Social Security. So that's when all my woes began," Bernard said.
Social Security told him it could only give him a credit and not a refund for the overpayment. That was the policy. ...He learned on Christmas Eve that Social Security denied his appeal.
That same day, his wife Carla came down with COVID-19.
"All of a sudden the room went sideways, and I was sick," she recalls.Still, Carla had enough strength to suggest Russ call 7 On Your Side.
"I said if anybody can get this fixed, it's 7 On Your Side, call them," she said.He did, and we contacted Social Security.
A spokesperson told us it couldn't comment due to privacy reason.
But it refunded $15,000 back into Bernard's bank account.
"7 On Your Side can't be beat," said Bernard. ...
8 comments:
This deserves a great big LIKE emoji! You made my day!
Funny how media attention works. It's going to become a first resort to go to the media, rather than a last resort, with wait times on the phone as they are. I'm sure it didn't take their news channel that long to answer. d;-)
Power of the press.
Sounds like someone couldn’t own up to checking what was input. I state this because:
1.) Online premiums clear through CMS, not Social Security. The blog from August 3rd , 2017 even says this.
2.) CMS controls the POMS HI policy and it is has never given guidance on *not* refunding premiums (I know, double negatives).
3.) In fact, it is quite common for requests to be received from the FO in the PSC to “ric” out excess Medicare premiums when no additional balance is owed and current billing is not active, especially for IRMAA Part D excess remittances. I’m fairly certain this would apply here because no basic Medicare bill is $1695.60. The benefit is likely in suspense for being less than the current benefit amount and the PSC prepared the bill on CMS letterhead and mailed to the beneficiary. Most of those will have gone out by now.
So again, smells like a cooked up story here in which SSA was not the culprit since it had nothing to do with inputting the amount of funds to be transferred, nor the actual website used to pay the bill -that”s all CMS. My guess is this guy went straight to the media after one call to SSA because the remittance was not on the register at the time (CMS updates nightly but it still takes time for the remittance to show up) and drummed up a fuss because he didn’t have his readers on when going online. When SSA got the press item, they shrugged and just had the PSC ric it to release the excess because nobody cared enough. That’s why no further statement was given because the only thing they could put in a response was that the beneficiary was at fault and they never reveal that.
Meanwhile thousands of other problems were solved the same day with no attention.
Having dealt with the media for years you always have to be a bit suspect about the Benes claims. Usually the conservative leaning station like stories like this.
Since these are PR issues you have to work thru it. Blaming the bene to the news doesn't work. Just move on with it.
Come on, folks, give the guy a break! He said he made a mistake, and asked for his excess money back. Whether SSA or CMS got his money, doesn't matter -- whichever agency got the ACH should refund the extra $$. Very few people could pay an extra $15,000 and not miss it. SSA/CMS needed a "push" to do the right thing, and it's shameful that it took a TV reporter's inquiry to do so.
When I worked for the SSA I often told people to just go to the media or their congress person. The FO didn't have the time to look into issues and the PSC was so backlogged that any request would take 6 months.
It's shameful and a big reason why I left after so many years of dedication. The SSA is more concerned with blaming the beneficiary for their misunderstandings (when the front-line employees often have poor policy knowledge themselves) and meeting PSIs that are poorly structured and often do not reflect actual customer service.
The whole thing needs to be reformed from the ground up. Managers are entrenched in a yes-person culture with no one to reach out to, to solve issues such as this. It's always someone else's fault, which while that may be true, there is often no one who has actual jurisdiction to fix said issues, or they are not available.
I started as a TST, then a BA, then PETE, transferred to the field as a lead SR, then a CS, then a TE, and then an RO support. The PC had a better culture about actually fixing problems but were often hamstrung by a completely disconnected central office. The FO and field support in the RO were just disgusting in their attempts to hit targets without meaning and a refusal to improve employees policy knowledge.
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