Medicare Registration Hits Snag After Snag

To the editor:

I retired on December 17, 2021. I filed for Medicare Plan B on November 8. I faxed it to the Ogden Social Security Administration (SSA) office. It failed. I mailed certified documents, the same day. I received the green receipt card on November 15. It was signed, but he/she did NOT date it, which is required by the U.S. Postal Service.

Called SSA several times, nothing. I uploaded my Plan B application in January 2022, requested by a SSA employee. February 23, called the Ogden SSA office, again nothing, the lady told me to mail my certified application again, to her attention. I received the green receipt on February 28th, with a signature/date of February 25.

Note: Only seven people working in Ogden office, processing applications.

March 23, called the Ogden office and the lady found my application and processed it right then! Only took about 10-15 minutes. She said, there were many applications that were older than mine. My effective date was March 1, so I paid for a month of coverage that had passed. Medicare charges $170.10month.

March 19, sent a letter (with copies of certified receipts) to the “Office of the Inspector General: Report Fraud, Waste, or Abuse Form” on the SSA website. He called me on the exact day my Plan B was approved. He apologized for the delay and explained how much they are short staffed. He also said the person that signed the first certified receipt was NOT in his department. That wrong department did NOT transfer my documents, so assumed the documents were lost. Nice to know!

My supplement insurance company is United Healthcare (UHC, highly recommend)! My agent had to send in my application to the main office, three times, because UHC has to work with SSA and they saw that I went three months without medical and drug coverage, so they stated, I needed to pay Late Enrollment Penalty. It took my agent several phone calls to explain what had happened. Finally, on April 22, my UHC was approved. I received my new medical card on April 25. This only took over five months!

You are allowed to receive monthly SSA payments before you retire, at a certain age. I had it deposited into my savings account. Now it is my monthly income, so I changed it to be deposited into my checking account. After three attempts, it has NOT been changed. I continue to call SSA.

This is how our government treats their citizens and this is only one example.

What ever happened to, “respect your elders?” Or should I say, “respect others.”

God, please help our country — we desperately need it!

Judy Wright

Logan