‘Like a punch in the face’: Oregon man now owes $99K in Social Security overpayments

A KIRO 7 Investigation is gaining traction in the nation’s capital with lawmakers demanding answers from the Social Security Administration and calls for congressional hearings.

This all comes in the wake of our reporting on billions of dollars in overpayments to vulnerable Americans who are now being asked to pay it back.

Consumer investigator Jesse Jones has also been getting calls and emails from viewers, including one from an Oregon resident.

“It’s like a huge punch in the face,” says Glen, who doesn’t want to use his last name but is one of the hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of people the agency says was overpaid benefits.

More than $ 21 billion dollars are still uncollected, and that’s even after the Social Security Administration has been clawing back cash at the rate of $4-6 billion dollars a year. Glen says how the government is doing it is dead wrong.

According to SSA records in 2012, Glen was found disabled due to a seizure disorder. He ended up working, and in 2016 was told his benefits ended and he owed the agency $61k. Glen appealed his case three times.

The federal agency cut the original $61k he owed down to $55k. Then in May, an administrative law judge lowered it again, to just over $38k. But 19 days after the judge signed that decision Glen got another letter saying he now owes $99k!

“That’s like receiving a collection agency notice that says you owe $99,000 without documenting why you owe it,” says Glen.

It’s a similar tale being told across the country. We teamed up with our sister stations in eight cities, seven states, and KFF Health News and found the impact these overpayments have on recipients has been immense.

Part of the problem may be due to understaffing at the agency. It’s down thousands of employees and is using old technology. And yes, some mistakes are because of income reporting. But even when the administration makes an error, recipients are still asked to repay the money, often years later.

“The reality is, you can do everything right and still get hit by a massive overpayment from Social Security,” says Rebecca Vallas, of The Century Foundation. She is an advocate for disability economic justice and has handled overpayment cases for years as an attorney.

Vallas says beneficiaries are generally some of the lowest-income people in this country.

“The agency knows full well that they don’t have some pile of cash that they’re sitting on,” he said.

Now we’re hearing from Congress. Senator Rick Scott from Florida believes the process is missing fairness.

“If somebody lied, if there was fraud, I mean, then that person ought to be responsible for that. But when the Social Security Administration tells you a number, then they should be held accountable,” says Scott.

Congressman Mike Carey sits on the Social Security Subcommittee in the House and is also voicing concern.

“They weren’t trying to game the system, they were just playing by the rules. And it’s very unfortunate. And I don’t want anybody to ever be in that situation again. So that’s why I think we need to have a hearing. We need to come to grips with where we are right now, find out what the problems are and fix the problems,” said Carey.

That’s all Glen wants. His math shows he is owed $14,000 from the government. And he wants his money, “the bureaucracy is so bad; I expect that I’ll be deceased before it’s resolved.”

Part of the issue here is the income limits placed on SSI recipients. It’s easy to go over them. They can only have $2k in assets for an individual and $3k as a couple.

There’s a bill in the Senate that would change that to $10,000 and $30,000 respectively. Senator Patty Murray sent me an email backing the bill saying. It’s

“a simple fix that would make a real difference for more than 137,000 people in Washington state who deserve to be able to save money and work towards financial independence without jeopardizing the SSI benefits they rely on to make ends meet.”

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