The Social Social Administration often fails to give out key details to retirees in face-to-face meetings and online that could cost people tens of thousands of dollars in benefits, according to a new study by the Government Accountability Office.
The report's main finding is that the SSA should do a better job of informing people that they could receive higher monthly payments if they delayed claiming retirement benefits.
Here are the two most egregious examples in the report:
- SSA claims specialists did not discuss the advantages to waiting to claim benefits at a later age in eight of 26 in-person interviews that the GAO observed where people could have received a higher monthly benefit if they had waited to claim. SSA requires all its staff to talk to people about the pros and cons of their filing decisions.
