TIAA and Full SS#'s?

[austin3515]

Has anyone ever asked TIAA CREF why their downloads do not include full SS#'s? IT makes working with their downloads incredibly difficult to match up with a client prepared cenus... Are they planning on changing this? I assume they've been inundated with this complaint...

[mbozek]

Has anyone ever asked TIAA CREF why their downloads do not include full SS#'s? IT makes working with their downloads incredibly difficult to match up with a client prepared cenus... Are they planning on changing this? I assume they've been inundated with this complaint...

Most vendors have opted to use only the last 4 digits of the SS number to reduce the risk of identity theft. For example Wage Works matches up the last 4 of the social with DOB to identify customers accounts. Other vendors use a unique identifier.

I thought that the trend in IT is to move away from using the 9 digit SS as an identifier to reduce the risk of theft of customer ID.

Also I thought TIAA is prohibited from using the full SS under state laws (CA) that are not prempted by ERISA from applying to the retirement accounts of public employees. It is my understanding that about 50% of TCs account holders are participants in public plans.

Its easier to use the last 4 SS digits as an identifier in the entire TC data base than to have separate identifiers for the public employees and the ERISA employee's accounts.

[austin3515]

How are other TPA's dealing with this? I assume all other TPA's struggle matching this stuff up as well? I have tried linking the DOB and the last 4 digits of the social as well, but of course the DOB's are not always accurate either...

Just wondering if anyone has a novel solution I have not heard of...

[david rigby]

We accept SSNs thru our secure website, and encourage clients/vendors to use it.