Social Security overpayment leaves widow without a check for more than a decade

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Next month, the Social Security Administration (SSA) is going completely paperless — a move the agency says will reduce fraud and cut administrative costs.

The shift to digital checks is one of several changes the SSA claims it has implemented under the Trump administration to modernize the system, including reducing disability claim backlogs and shortening wait times on the phone and at field offices.

However, one major issue still hasn’t been fixed: how the agency collects overpayments.

For the past two years, 9 Investigates has reported on how the SSA demands repayment of benefits it claims were issued in error — sometimes years or even decades after the fact — by withholding entire monthly checks, leaving vulnerable Americans with little or no income.

One of those affected is Clare Gundersen, a widow from Winter Garden who says she’s been caught in a bureaucratic nightmare that’s lasted more than a decade.

“They took my money away. I don’t have a penny.”

Clare Gundersen and her husband were married for 47 years. Both worked at MetLife and retired at age 65.

When her husband died in 2010, she went to the SSA office to begin collecting his Social Security.

That, she says, was the beginning of the nightmare. “I went down to Social Security when he died, and it was my biggest mistake.”

Clare says she began receiving survivor benefits, but in 2015 — five years later — she received a letter from the SSA saying her late husband owed the government nearly $100,000. The agency claimed she had been overpaid and demanded the money back.

“They took away all my money,” she told 9 Investigates.

Clare says the checks just stopped coming. Like dozens of others we’ve interviewed, her bank account was never accessed, but her benefits were completely withheld.

And the worst part? She says she still has no idea what she did wrong.

“I wrote letters to everybody. Not one person helped me. Some didn’t even answer me. When I went down to the office, they told me: ‘Go home. You’ve got to wait.’ Wait for what?”

No Answers. No Income. No Way to Fight Back.

9 Investigates, in collaboration with Cox Media Group stations and KFF Health News, has uncovered dozens of cases where overpayment collection tactics have left people homeless, bankrupt, or worse.

At one point, 2 million people a year were getting overpayment notices. Clare is one of them.

She says she hasn’t been able to collect her own Social Security benefits either, because the agency somehow has two Social Security numbers on file for her — an error she says she has tried for years to correct with no success.

For more than a decade, she’s lived without her rightful benefits.

“I get nothing now. I’m living off $297,” Clare said, referring to a small retirement payout.“I couldn’t pay my rent.”

She now lives with family, surviving on that small, fixed income.

Although the SSA temporarily changed its policy after our earlier reports, limiting collections to just 10% of a monthly check.

The agency has now reversed that. They’re back to withholding 100% of some checks again.

And for Clare, the nightmare may not end until it’s too late.

Her most recent letter from the SSA says she’ll receive no benefits until 2028… she’ll be 92 years old.

“They won’t give it back to me when I’m 92. By then, I’ll be dead.”

9 Investigates contacted the Social Security Administration on Clare’s behalf. A spokesperson responded:

“Privacy laws preclude us from commenting on this case. We will contact Ms. Gundersen directly.”

Clare says she’s still waiting.

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