Form 8955--SSA

On the old Schedule SSA, reporting terminated participants with unpaid vested benefits was mandatory but reporting them after they had received a distribution was optional.  So, we never did it.  Now we have a little over 2,000 people who were probably reported as term vesteds with a balance and never removed upon subsequent payment.  Their payment dates were from 1994 to 2005.

The problem we have now is that these people are receiving letters from the Social Security Administration reporting that they may have a benefit due. It is sometimes difficult to convince people that they were paid.  After all, a government agency is telling them to contact us.   We have the check number, amount, and payment date, and even in most cases signed distribution election forms, but we no longer have the canceled checks so people don't always believe us.  And much of our information is on microfilm which requires in-person research, which is a bit of a hassle.

How appropriate would it be, the next time we file the 8955-SSA, to report these people as having been paid out?  Is this a huge red flag?   Would it trigger unwelcome attention from some agency or another?

If they are no longer due a benefit, I don't think there is a time limit on reporting them as "D".

Now how well that gets translated to removing them from the government data base so they don't get the "you may have a benefit" letter I can't say. I also don't know if reporting a large number of "D", possibly in excess of the current participant count(?) would be viewed by the programs that filter for potential additional attention.