[Sandy222]

My friend has been declared dead...and her social security checks returned and deducted from her account. ..she is alive and well!!! This is the 2nd time this has happened to her....what a nightmare. She has to go down to the social security office in Leesburgh and prove that she is alive. This is so absurd. Has anyone else experienced this?

[Bogie Shooter]

Originally Posted by Sandy222

My friend has been declared dead...and her social security checks returned and deducted from her account. ..she is alive and well!!! This is the 2nd time this has happened to her....what a nightmare. She has to go down to the social security office in Leesburgh and prove that she is alive. This is so absurd. Has anyone else experienced this?

Remember there are a lot of us!

[Cassie325]

On Monday's they have the woman from SS on the radio show. Call in and she will help you! she is so great on that show and has many times called people after the show to help them. Worth the call!

[Carla B]

Yes, her name is Pauline Walz. Her office is in Leesburg. She sounds very knowledgeable about the workings of Social Security.

Does your friend have a very common name? All kinds of frustrating things happen to people with common names. My son and wife's sizeable IRS refund was just confiscated and sent to California for nonpayment of child support. Interesting, in that they have never lived in California, and neither one has ever had any children. He suffers from having a common name, as does my husband, who's on the no-fly list, is known for being a deadbeat, an alcoholic who didn't pay for his rehabilitation, etc. etc.. If you have an uncommon name, be thankful as you will avoid a lot of trouble!

[Bryan]

Sure, large organizations like Social Security or the IRS can make mistakes. In this day and age, identity theft is also a big problem. Anyone who runs into these kinds of problems (declared dead by SSA, IRS refunds conficated, etc.) should order their free credit reports and review them carefully to make sure they are not victims of ID Theft. If you are, that is another whole ball game and you will have your work cut out for you but that is too big a subject to discuss in detail here.

The important point is to make sure the "bad" thing that happened was just some bureaucratic mistake and not ID Theft.

[Boomer]

My name is relatively common. There are a lot of Boomers, you know.

When I banged up my knee, the ortho doc had 3 or 4 of me in his database.

(I think he probably still remembers which one I am though because my knees are extremely ticklish. Laughter is contagious, of course. And during the exam he ended up laughing hysterically, too. His nurse came into the room to see what in the heck I was doing to him. And guess what. She started laughing with us. When I had to have fluid removed from that knee -- some of you know probably about that huge square needle they use for that -- my laughter from my knee being touched was interspersed with my spouting out bad words to let him know how it felt. I think the poor guy thought I needed another kind of doc at that point.)

But I digress.

Anyway, I always double check my name and info in any database to make sure it is me. I found a crossed wire in my medical records at my primary care doc's office. The record showed that I was taking mads that I was not. There was another time when I received someone else's notice of bad results on a test. I got all this straightened out, until next time, of course. And I also put one of those lock things on the credit report and I keep my fingers crossed. You have to figure that those out there, wherever in the world they are, entering our data, are bound to screw up sometimes. And it could end up a real nightmare, especially considering that the info has a way of migrating from database to database.

Sandy, I hope your friend can find the right people to help her straighten this mess out.

Boomer

[Sandy222]

Social Security personel was very helpful today and hopefully my friend will have her check in 5 -7 days. There was an issue with the bank she was dealing with out of state.

All banking accounts would have been frozen but since she had a trust she was still able to access her bank account. This is defintely an advantage in having a trust.