TRC

Contacting The Social Security Administration

After mom passed away in August 2024, there were many things I had to take care of involving her estate.  One of them was to notify the Social Security Administration (SSA) to report her passing.  When I met with the Funeral Director, she confirmed with me that the funeral home would contact the SSA as part of their procedure and that I would not need to.  The funeral home made the notification, but the SSA did not fully complete their record keeping. 

By January 2025, I had received a third letter from Medicare stating that a Medicare premium was due.  I called Medicare (which took an hour between the wait time and the communication with the representative) asking them how I could get the notifications stopped.  The Medicare representative confirmed that everything on the Medicare side was correct.  The issue was that the SSA did not complete all of their required tasks and I would need to contact them to stop the Medicare notices.  It sounds strange that I would need to call the SSA to stop a Medicare notice, but that's what happened.  The Medicare representative said that it is very difficult to get through to the SSA and the best advice she could give me was to start calling early in the morning.

As of this writing, I have not tried calling yet.  But a contact on a social media site was successful in getting through to the SSA and, with his permission, I'm happy to share his advice is below.  My thanks to him for sharing this information.

 

Call the 800 number: (800) 772-1213. Go through the annoying prompts...keep responding "Customer Service".

Then, you should receive an option for a call back. DO THIS ONLY one time per day, as if you try to request a call back more than once per day, they will not give you that option.

The callback will take several hours and you don't know when they will call you. So keep your phone with you at all times.

When the rep calls you back, ask them to please schedule an appointment on your behalf at the local SSA office. At first, they may tell you that they can't, but hold their feet to the fire and make them do it. If they continue to refuse, get their name and then call again the next day and speak with someone else who will help.

And while you are on the phone with the next rep, you can report anyone who failed to provide assistance.

 

 

The following information was obtained from the Social Security Administration website.

You can call us at 1-800-772-1213 between 8:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m. local time, Monday through Friday. Wait times to speak to a representative are typically shorter in the morning, later in the week, and later in the month. Our automated telephone services are available 24 hours a day and do not require you to wait to speak with a representative.




Created: 02/08/2025
Updated: 02/08/2025