Tuesday, November 26, 2024

Show me the money

Got a notice Sunday that the Social Security Administration was going to deduct 3X of what they’re currently doing monthly to pay for basic Medicare because I earned $XXX…in 2023. Ipso facto, I can afford big bucks for the service, QED.

Well, okay, fine—except that I was employed for part of 2023, ergo the $XXX, but I was laid off in May of that year and so my income is definitely no longer $XXX.

Which they know, because I submitted all the information on the proper form back in February, when they tried the same thing based on my income in 2022.

So yesterday I spent more than an hour waiting on hold for SSA, getting disconnected and then talking with a guy who told me, “You have to do this every year. Probably for several years. We can’t use what you submitted before.”

Swell.

FYSA: When you submit the SSA form, you have to attach documents to substantiate your income claim, “AGI, as used on line 11 of IRS form 1040”. Only, in November I have no 1099s, W-2s and no 1040 for…2024. So I spent another three hours trying to find statements (SSA does not let you pull year-to-date information from their site, yay). I ended up doing a filtered search on my bank site to kludge together that information, which wasn’t easy. Printed everything out and took it over to the local SSA office (thank God they opened one in the People’s Republic).

Last time, it took them three months to agree that I am no longer making $XXX and reduce the premium deductions. I hope it doesn’t take that long this time.

Since they already have all the information.

Anyway, that’s taken care of. For another year. Yippee.

 

©2024 Bas Bleu

 


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