Reply to Social Security - Representative Payee

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[quote=Anonymous]I don't know if things have changed due to pandemic, but social security refuses take information from me to get my mom set up for her rightful entitlement to my recently-deceased dad's social security unless I am the representative payee, and is also making it nearly impossible to become the representative payee.

1) called to inform ss that my dad died. get issued a telephone appointment for several months in the future to arrange her widow benefits, am told that I need to apply to be representative payee before the call, they don't care that i am her DPoA, and won't talk to me unless I am her representative payee.

2) get the appointment confirmation, they have recorded the wrong phone number.

3) go down to social security office with all her paperwork and the confirmation, stand in line for an hour, only to be told that they refuse to allow me to apply for representative payee as I will need to do that during the phone meeting, and they won't fix the phone number either, i need to call some other number to do that.

4) call the other number, get the phone number fixed, am told that i cannot apply to be a representative payee on the phone, it needs to be an in-person interview. can i get to an office? the office i am literally standing in front of? oh, they didn't mean *today*. they change my appointment to an in-person appointment. ask what i need to bring to the meeting, am told just my dad's death cert.

5) show up to appointment with absolutely all of my parents documentation. (i'm talking passports, ss cards, medicare cards, powers of attorney, wills, birth certs, marriage certs, nursing home assessments, etc., and the death cert.) stand in line for an hour in an attempt to check in... they checked in one person during that hour. There were two people in front of me. also check in online. eventually they call my name while i am still in line to check in. go to desk. "did you check in? you need to check in up front." "i had been in line for an hour to check in when you called our name."  "i guess i'll try to check you in."

6) then they come back and tell me that i cannot apply to be representative payee without a form signed by her doctor that THEY WILL NOT GIVE TO ME. I now have to get her doctor send a fax to this individual so they can fax her doctor the secret form that they will fill out and fax back. Of course this is the first time anyone has mentioned a form in all of my calls and visits to social security. I had her most recent assessment (required by DC for anyone in memory care), that details all of the ways she cannot meet activities of daily living and her cognitive impairments, and the fact that she's on hospice, but since it's not their form they don't care.

Of course, I live in DC so I don't have a senator's office that can actually help cut red tape. If it wouldn't be so traumatic for her, I'd just drag my non-verbal frail wheelchair-bound mother down to the office and let them deal with the reality of her condition, but I can't do that to her, it might literally kill her.

If it were just the $255 widows benefit, I'd give up, but the difference between her benefit and my dad's is about $1300 and so will potentially cover a few more months of memory care before I have to move her to a medicaid facility because the money has run out.

The whole thing is just frustrating and heartbreaking. How does anyone jump through these hoops?[/quote]

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