House lawmakers introduced on Thursday the Social Security Overpayment Relief Act, a bill to limit the Social Security Administration’s overpayment lookback period to 10 years.
Reps. Kristen McDonald Rivet, D-Mich., and Zach Nunn, R-IA, introduced the bill. Sens. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., and Bill Cassidy, R-La., are introducing companion legislation in the Senate.
As it stands now, "an indefinite lookback period allows the SSA to collect funds from a recipient for an overpayment error going back decades, resulting in collection notices totaling tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars," Rivet and Nunn said in a statement.
The bill would limit that period to 10 years for Social Security, Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients. The limit would not apply to those who committed fraud or other crimes, the lawmakers said.
“Overpayments can put seniors in thousands of dollars worth of debt through no fault of their own," Rivet said in the statement. "When the government comes to collect after decades of mispayments, that can throw someone into a financial crisis."
Added Nunn: "While we need to root out waste, fraud, and abuse within our federal government, we can't risk doing that on the backs of seniors on a fixed income.”
On Monday, the Social Security Administration said that it will increase the default overpayment withholding rate for Social Security beneficiaries to 100% of a person’s monthly benefit, undoing a policy change enacted less than a year ago that set the rate at 10%.
SSA said it would begin mailing notices about the new 100% withholding rate, which applies to new overpayments of Social Security benefits, on March 27.
"The withholding rate for current beneficiaries with an overpayment before March 27 will not change and no action is required," SSA said in a statement. The withholding rate for Supplemental Security Income overpayments remains 10%.
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