From a recent report by Social Security's Office of Inspector General:
We conducted this review to determine the extent to which the data files the Social Security Administration (SSA) provided the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to facilitate economic impact payments (EIP) under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) were accurate and complete when they were transmitted. ...
The data files SSA sent IRS were not always complete or accurate.
- SSA’s methodology for identifying beneficiaries who received payments in Calendar Year (CY) 2020 or 2021 resulted in the erroneous (1) exclusion of information for 73,541 beneficiaries who received OASDI payments in CYs 2020 and/or 2021 and (2) inclusion of information for 308,603 OASDI beneficiaries who did not receive an OASDI payment in CY 2020 or 2021.
- SSA also erroneously included information on approximately 177,000 beneficiaries and recipients who died before January 1, 2021 and were not likely eligible for payments.
- Finally, SSA included 4,173,293 individuals’ information 2 or more times in the data files provided to the IRS, including instances where duplicate records included different residential address or bank account information for the same individual.
We did not have access to the IRS’ EIP3 payment information. As a result, we could not determine whether these errors resulted in any duplicate payments, non-payment to eligible individuals, deposits into incorrect bank accounts, or mailing of paper checks to incorrect addresses ...
6 comments:
Someone please offer a solution rather than just belaboring the problems.
Solution #1 - Gain access to IRS EIP3 to determine whether these errors resulted in any duplicate payments, non-payment....etc..etc... If so, send a check, or an overpayment bill, depending on which is appropriate.
Solution #2 - First complete Solution #1.
How about remove SSA from the equation completely. I like that one.
6:39, this was a way to get EIPs to millions of elderly and disabled people who are not required to file tax returns. SSA's data-sharing saved the IRS from processing return that people who otherwise weren't required to file would have submitted to get their EIP, and helped other people who wouldn't have known how to file to get their funds at all.
With that said, I do think it's problematic that the money went to rep payees without any sort of instruction that this money shouldn't be managed the same as Social Security benefits; there was nothing in the law that said people could have payees for EIPs so they should have been allowed to manage the money themselves absent some sort of guardianship or conservatorship.
Also, this report doesn't look into how often the direct deposit information provided to the Treasury Department was incorrect. There were sporadic reports on this blog of claimants' reps getting EIPs for their former clients (probably in rare situations where the rep was the last one paid on the case, like a closed period where no benefits got paid out) and I wonder if similar things happened with state Interim Assistance Reimbursement programs.
11:21, yes but Treasury should be leading this. If they find overpayment they can use the TOP to get the money back from people's Social Security benefits. But it wouldn't be a Social Security or SSI overpayment per se.
Use SSA’s information at your own risk. Claimants are necessarily the best reporters of change, especially SSI recipients.
If there is an issue, the agency responsible for issuing the payments should be on the hook for any overpayments and such. Leave SSA out of it. It’s not part of SSA’s programs.
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