When seeking advice on Social Security claiming, one must be careful who to consult.
A lot of Social Security advice that gets implemented is based on conversation with friends and family or around the water cooler with co-workers, comparing the age that they claimed benefits.
Everyone’s circumstances are unique and so one temptation may be to go directly to the Social Security Administration for advice about claiming strategies, bypassing all other sources.
It may be a surprise to find out that the Social Security Administration is prohibited by law to give you claiming advice on how to maximize your benefit. Those that you speak with will certainly be kind and helpful and do their best to process your benefit claim, but they can’t add value to your situation by pointing out maximization strategies.
In fact, without their knowledge of your full retirement situation, even if they could give advice, it would be incomplete since there is an interdependent and synergistic result that occurs when making claiming decisions in the context of all of your other financial resources and goals.
There are certainly additional circumstances where Social Security Administration representatives give incorrect claiming information. If what you hear from the Social Security Administration isn’t what you expect, don’t necessarily take it at face value. They do make errors and so it is always worth double checking what they tell you with a supervisor or with a National Social Security Advisor.
If you have any questions please feel free to contact me
