{"id":2173,"date":"2025-05-20T13:57:23","date_gmt":"2025-05-20T20:57:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.narfe.org\/wa\/?page_id=2173"},"modified":"2025-05-20T14:25:19","modified_gmt":"2025-05-20T21:25:19","slug":"hr82-update-may-2025","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.narfe.org\/wa\/resources\/faqs\/social-security-fairness-act-information\/hr82-update-may-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"HR82 Update May 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"
The following information was shared on May 15, 2025. Many thanks to Mike Teefy, President Vancouver 0131 and retired SSA employee<\/em><\/div>\n
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This an update on the Social Security Fairness Act<\/h4>\n
Most of our members were affected by the Windfall Elimination Provisions [WEP] and the Government Pension Offset [GPO]. When the legislation was passed by Congress and signed by President Biden in January 2025, the language of the law stated that both provisions no longer applied and the new law was effective January 2024. There are approximately 3 million individuals who were now eligible for Social Security benefits as spouses or survivors and those who had been WEP were entitled to a significant increase in their Social Security payments.<\/div>\n
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Retroactive benefit payment \u2013 protect yourself by filing SSA 561<\/h5>\n
Those who had their benefit reduced due to WEP\u00a0[benefits on their own record]<\/strong>\u00a0were issued retroactive payment back to January 2024 and they received a lump sum in March 2025.<\/div>\n
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Those who had filed a claim for Spouse\u2019s or Survivor\u2019s benefits and were entitled to a reduced benefit or who were in total offset were also suppose to be issued retroactive benefits back to January 2024, but they were only paid retroactive benefits back 6 months<\/em><\/strong> from the date of the Social Security appointment.<\/div>\n
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Everyone who had not file a Social Security claim were instructed to make an appointment with Social Security and file for Spouse\u2019s or Survivor\u2019s benefits.<\/div>\n
Due to the shear number of claimants [almost 3 million] and with SSA being hit with massive staff reductions our members had great difficulty contacting SSA to make an appointment, since SSA no longer allowed in-office or walk-in appointments. Because of these problems many individuals were unable to contact SSA to make an appointment until February, March, April or even May.<\/div>\n
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SSA in processing these new claims have only gone back 6 months from the date of you scheduled your appointment to pay you retroactive benefits. The current SSA provisions for retroactive benefits is 6 months, which is in conflict with the legislation that states the WEP and GPO provisions are no longer effective January 2024. So, everyone who is filing for benefits are being paid for different retroactive months. It is obvious that with the difficulty individuals have had contacting SSA to make an appointment it is unfair and incorrect that SSA is using your appointment date to determine your retroactive payment. US Senators, NARFE members and other affected groups who were affected by WEP or GPO have stated that SSA is not conforming to the legislation in paying benefit retroactive to January 2024 and requesting clarification of why SSA is not paying individuals back to January 2024. To date SSA has not stated why SSA is not paying benefits back to January 2024 for GPO cases and new GPO applications.<\/div>\n
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Because this issue of retroactivity has not been resolved I am advising anyone who has filed and did not receive retroactive benefits back to January 2024 to file a\u00a0SSA 561 Request for Reconsideration<\/a>.\u00a0This will protect your rights until SSA resolves this issue or Congress or the courts require SSA to conform to the legislation and the effective date of January 2024.<\/strong><\/div>\n
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If you download and print a copy of the SSA<\/strong> 561<\/strong><\/a> it should be filled out as follows:<\/p>\n