Social Security Administration

With his term soon to expire, Social Security chief Martin O’Malley’s efforts to address the agency’s overpayments to beneficiaries remain incomplete.

Commissioner Martin O’Malley testifies to two Senate panels that his agency will stop the “injustices” of suspending people’s monthly benefits to recover alleged overpayments.

Kilolo Kijakazi sent the letter days after KFF Health News and Cox Media Group reported the agency has been demanding money back from more than twice as many people as she’d disclosed in October.

Sen. Ron Wyden, chair of the Senate Finance Committee, vowed to meet monthly with Social Security officials until the problems surrounding overpayment demands are fixed.

More than 2 million people a year have been sent notices that Social Security overpaid them and demanding they repay the money. That’s twice as many as the head of Social Security disclosed at a hearing in October.

Lawmakers are asking what Social Security will do about its demands on their constituents to repay money distributed — and sometimes in error. Florida Sen. Rick Scott called the actions “unacceptable.”

At a Senate confirmation hearing, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley said he would address hardships the Social Security agency has caused by demanding money back from beneficiaries.

COVID-19 relief payments weren’t supposed to cost people their Social Security benefits, but some recipients say they did. Senators want to know why.

In the wake of an investigation by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group, the SSA acting commissioner said a special team will review “overpayment policies and procedures” and report directly back to her.

Lawmakers are faulting the SAA for issuing billions in payments that beneficiaries weren’t entitled to receive — and then demanding the money back — as reported by KFF Health News and Cox Media Group.

Beneficiaries in five states described what happened when they received demands to return overpayments that reached up to tens of thousands of dollars or more.

Social Security benefits will increase by 8.7 percent in 2023 to adjust for cost-of-living increases. The latest data show inflation in Tampa's metro surpassed the national average with a 10.5 percent increase in prices.