Former Social Security and SSI beneficiaries who still owe an overpayment can have their federal tax refunds taken, and the agency says the tool has been working since it restarted in March 2025. In an Oct. 23, 2026 release, Commissioner Frank Bisignano’s agency reported that the Treasury Offset Program has returned $645 million in delinquent programmatic debt to the Social Security Trust Funds. The collection comes only after a notice that gives the debtor 60 days to respond.
The $645 million is Social Security’s own count, and the release does not say how many people or how many debts it covers. The rules that decide who is selected, and what stops the offset, are in the agency’s operating manual.
What the Treasury Offset Program does
The program is run by Treasury. According to the manual, it matches delinquent debts owed to Social Security against federal payments due to the debtor and withholds those payments. Tax refunds are the main target for Social Security debts, under separate rules for Title II retirement and disability debts and Title XVI SSI debts.
The agency suspended collection through the program in March 2020 and resumed it in March 2025, the manual says. People referred before the suspension received pre-offset notices before collections restarted. Anyone who has moved since a notice was sent should confirm that Social Security has a current mailing address.
Ongoing benefits are handled differently. The manual says the program does not collect Social Security debts by offsetting Social Security benefit payments; the agency recovers those internally. That distinction explains why the offset reaches a former beneficiary rather than a person currently receiving checks.
Who gets selected for a tax refund offset
For retirement and disability debts, the section on tax refund offset sets the test. The debtor must be alive, not entitled to current benefits and at least 18 when the debt was established. The debt must be $25 or more, past due, legally enforceable and not covered by a regular installment agreement.
The SSI version has the same shape. Under the May 2025 transmittal for the SSI chapter, a debt is selected only if the debtor is not currently SSI-eligible, owes $25 or more and is not making regular installment payments. Debts with a delinquency date of May 19, 2002 or earlier are no longer referred.
Selection runs weekly, according to the retirement-and-disability section. Social Security must first send a pre-offset notice that states the amount owed and says it plans to refer the debt to Treasury. The notice is mailed to a verified address, and an undeliverable notice stops referral to Treasury, credit bureau reporting and administrative wage garnishment.
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The 60 days after the notice
The clock starts on the date of the notice. Social Security certifies a debt to Treasury no less than 60 days after that date, so the window is the debtor’s one clean chance to stop the referral. The notice states the amount, and Treasury sends its own offset notice later, on or before the payment’s normal due date.
Within the 60 days, the agency will not take the planned action if the debtor pays in full, makes payments under an installment agreement, requests a waiver, or shows that all or part of the debt is not owed. The manual lists evidence that works, such as payment receipts, a waiver approval, a pending hearing request, a death report or bankruptcy papers.
A debtor can also ask for an explanation of the overpayment or a review of the records. Reporting that the original overpayment or the notice never arrived is another listed route. The practical step for anyone holding a notice is to note the date on it and count 60 days forward.
Waivers, appeals and what a refund offset costs
The waiver is form SSA-632. Social Security says to file it if the person agrees they were overpaid, did not cause the overpayment and cannot afford to repay it, and the agency says it will stop recovering the overpayment until it decides. For tax refund offset, the manual adds that the offset continues until Social Security receives the completed form SSA-632-BK.
A person who disagrees that the overpayment exists files form SSA-561, a request for reconsideration. A person who agrees but cannot manage the recovery rate files form SSA-634. The agency lists all three on its forms page, and each can be completed online or sent in.
Once a refund is offset, getting it back is hard. The manual says refunds of offset amounts are limited, generally to cases with a waiver or protest pending before certification, an approved waiver, or an error such as a wrong account number. The SSI chapter adds that if a valid debt is disputed late, Social Security generally keeps the money.
The same SSI chapter lists other collection tools that follow a pre-offset notice. These include credit bureau reporting for debts delinquent up to 6 years and 6 months, offsets against federal payments such as an OPM pension up to 25% of the net payment, and vendor payments. A tax refund is one tool among several.
The $645 million figure shows how much has moved since March 2025, and it explains why notices are going out again. For a household, the number that matters is the refund. A tax refund of a few hundred dollars can be the whole cushion for a winter heating bill, and a missed 60-day window is how it ends up in a Trust Fund account instead.
Holding a Social Security debt notice with a 60-day clock?
The 60 days run from the date printed on the notice, not from the day it is opened. A notice that sits in a pile can use half of the window before anyone looks, and a tax refund offset that has already been certified is much harder to reverse.
The Social Security Check Protection Kit holds Part 5, Overpayments: The Full Playbook, along with the three SSA forms that stop or pause collection (SSA-561, SSA-632 and SSA-634) and the 2026 payment calendar. The worksheets and deadline calendar in Part 8 give a household one place to log the notice date and count forward.
Get the overpayment playbook, the three SSA forms and the 2026 payment calendar →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
