This man says he's very much alive, but Social Security says no. This is the headache he's endured
'Anybody listening out there, John H. Reed III is alive,' the Locust Grove resident told Channel 2 consumer investigator Justin Gray.
But Reed has been officially dead as far as the federal government is concerned since early April.
That means his bank, credit cards, and even health insurance all think he is dead, too.
'I found out I was dead by a letter I received on the 8th of April, a condolences letter from my insurance company, and then that was followed by a letter from Social Security,' Reed said.
That Social Security letter announced his benefits were cut off. On his most recent trip to the doctor, Reed was told his insurance was canceled.
'I presented my Blue Cross Blue Shield card and my Medicare card, A and B, and they told me I wasn't in the system,' he said.
It all comes back to the death master file that the Social Security Administration maintains.
Reed was, for some reason, listed as dead there, and that was communicated to places like banks and credit cards.
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The Social Security Inspector General told Channel 2 Action News that it is launching a new audit in the next month into 'reasons SSA recorded erroneous deaths and whether it complied with policy when correcting them.'
For nearly a decade, Channel 2 Action News has been investigating mistakes with the Social Security death master file.
SSA collects data from states and from other sources, like funeral homes and financial institutions
In 2016, Gloria Ornsby told Gray that her home nurse stopped showing up, and her seizure medications couldn't be filled after she was mistakenly added to the death master file.
Martin O'Malley, the Social Security Commissioner under President Biden, said he's concerned that thousands of recent job cuts at SSA are leading to an increase in these incorrect death listings.
'They are terminating people's financial lives, making their bank accounts get closed, they can't open up a new bank account. We've all seen what a hassle it is if our credit card or debit card gets hacked, well imagine that happening, and then you can't open up the new account,' O'Malley said.
The Reeds had to come home early from their Florida vacation to try to fix this.
'Can you imagine that? Waking up and then at zero, nothing's in the bank account. I said, 'Oh, I guess we'll be going back home,'' Reed said.
SSA said in a release posted in March on its website that 'less than one-third of 1% are erroneously reported deaths that need to be corrected.'
That's not much solace for Reed.
'It's very stressful to be dead. If you're not dead, this will kill you,' he said.
After repeated trips to the Social Security office, SSA now tells Reed he is officially resurrected from the dead, but he still has not received either of his missing retirement checks.
The Social Security Administration has not responded to our request for comment.
The Social Security Inspector General said its new audit is its first look at this topic since 2021 and 'will assess the effectiveness of SSA's internal controls related to detecting, preventing, and removing incorrect death reports for beneficiaries.'
On its website, SSA said people incorrectly listed as dead should go to their local SSA office and 'should be prepared to bring at least one piece of current (not expired) original form of identification. Social Security takes immediate action to correct its records, and the agency can provide a letter that the error has been corrected that can be shared with other organizations, agencies, and employers.'
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