The money went to deceased Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income (Title II) beneficiaries discovered by cross-checking SSA data with medical claim information from the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS).
Investigators reviewed a sample of 100 current Title XVI recipients over age 90 from California, New York and Texas, and found that 30 of them were dead and had been gone for an average of five years. One woman died more than 27 years ago.
Investigators believe SSA is also paying millions more to dead and disqualified people through a program for poor blind, elderly and disabled individuals.
“When the agency does not receive timely death reports or information about recipients who live outside the United States, improper payments occur,” the IG said. “As such, we believe SSA would benefit by taking additional steps to better identify deceased recipients.”
