Social Security Demands Almost $100,000 Back From Alabama Man

A man in Alabama was asked to pay back to the Social Security Administration (SSA) nearly $100,000 after the federal agency said the beneficiary had received payments beyond what he was due.

Mike Burrow, a teacher and football coach in a Jefferson County high school, is a recipient of Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) benefits, which he became entitled to after suffering a massive heart attack, as reported by WAFF 48 News, which first covered the story of the man.

In 2014, Burrow started working again as a substitute teacher and four years later, he took a long-term teaching position to fill in for a teacher who had surgery. This, without him realizing so, pushed him over the earned income required for the kind of Social Security benefits he was receiving.

His wife, Vivian Burrow, told WAFF 48 that in 2018 they went over by $2,000 that year, but they were not aware of it. Neither was the SSA, which only realized that Burrow no longer fulfilled the benefits' requirements in late 2021. By then, the amount of overpayments made to Burrow had accumulated to a staggering high amount.

A letter from the SSA in late 2021 asked Burrow to pay back $92,000 within 30 days. For Burrow, the request felt like "a mistake," as he imagined that the federal agency made yearly checks on its beneficiaries.

But what Burrow assumed was a mistake is a fairly common practice for the federal agency, which has asked billions of dollars back from millions of beneficiaries, as emerged following an investigation earlier this year. Many of the beneficiaries are on low income, on disability or retired, and are unable to repay the huge sums requested by the federal agency.

According to data by the SSA's inspector general shared by news agencies, the SSA received a total of $4.7 billion in overpayments in the 2022 fiscal year, while $21.6 billion remain outstanding. The agency claims back this money by reducing or stopping monthly benefit payments, intercepting federal tax refunds, or seizing wages.

The revelation of the repayments asked by the agency from millions of Americans, and the anguish felt by beneficiaries suddenly faced with a huge bill, sparked outrage among the U.S. public and politicians, eventually leading to Congress launching an investigation into the matter.

This week, the agency apologized for congressional testimony that dramatically understated how many people the agency has demanded money back from after overpayments. During the hearing, Kilolo Kijakazi, the acting commissioner of the SSA, said that the agency had sent overpayment notices to 1,028,389 for the 2022 fiscal year and to 986,912 for 2023.

In a letter sent this week, Kijakazi admitted that the actual number was about 2 million a year. Newsweek contacted the SSA for comment by email on Wednesday.

Have you been sent an overpayment notice by the Social Security Administration? Contact g.carbonaro@newsweek.com to share your story.