Social Security to End Applying for Benefits by Phone

The change could be particularly challenging for people with disabilities, especially in rural regions “where lack of access to transportation is an ongoing concern,” said Wendy Strobel Gower, executive director of the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability at Cornell University. “Disruptions in payments and services will have devastating consequences.”

Change linked to data hacks

Currently, the SSA uses what Dudek called “knowledge-based authentication” to check customers’ identity over the phone, asking a series of questions “to help us identify who you are.” But with personal identifying information widely available to bad actors due to large-scale hacks of corporate data, he said, “knowledge-based authentication is dead.”

Starting March 31, people applying for Social Security or changing banking information over the phone will be directed to use their My Social Security account at ssa.gov to verify their identity online. If they cannot do so, the SSA says they will need to go to a local Social Security office and confirm their identity in person.

According to the most recent SSA data, the agency received more than 10.4 million applications for retirement, family, survivor and disability benefits in 2023. An SSA spokesperson says about 63 percent of applications for retirement benefits, disability benefits and Medicare (which the agency also processes) are currently filed online.

In 2023 about 119,000 people visited local Social Security offices daily to get help or receive services. The SSA announced plans last month to reduce its workforce by 12 percent, from about 57,000 employees to 50,000, and multiple offices have been closed in recent weeks, according to the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the office established by President Donald Trump to slash federal spending.

Dudek acknowledged the new policy would increase visitor traffic at local offices, which now require customers to call in advance and schedule an appointment in most cases to get help in person.

“We’re spending the next two weeks to train our field [offices] to respond to these changes,” he said. “We’re going to adjust our policy and our procedures to adapt to that volume.”

‘Deeply unacceptable’

SSA staffing was already near a 50-year low when the agency initiated the planned reductions. AARP and other advocates have called on Congress to provide resources for the SSA to boost hiring capacity and address customer service problems, notably long hold times on calls to the agency’s toll-free helpline and waits averaging eight months for initial decisions on disability claims.

"The average callback time on SSA's phones to make an in-person appointment is over two hours; the wait for an appointment is over a month," said Kathleen Romig, director of Social Security and disability policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a Washington, D.C., think tank. "Millions more people seeking in-person service from SSA, combined with cutting 7,000 staff, will cause further delays for everyone seeking help."

AARP also raised questions about the SSA's rapid implementation of the ID change.

“Asking tens of millions of Americans to jump through new hoops and prove their identity in the next 13 days to access the customer service they have paid for is deeply unacceptable,” LeaMond wrote in a March 19 letter to Dudek, expressing “strong opposition” to curtailing phone services.

While purportedly designed to combat fraud, the new policy could “have the opposite effect,” LeaMond added. “Creating a confusing new set of identity requirements on unfamiliar app platforms, with just a few weeks to comply, without a clear public education campaign, will provide criminals a ripe environment to steal the sensitive information of Americans and drain their life savings.”

In his press conference, Dudek suggested the new ID requirements could be temporary, saying that as it rolls out the policy, the SSA is also exploring ways to “effectively identity-proof our telephone service.”

“I’ve made a commitment to the White House and Congress that we will monitor the situation closely, and if it is to the detriment of our citizens that we serve, then we’re going to take necessary actions to improve those services,” he said. “If that means backing out [of] the policy, we’ll back it out. But we need to see what the results are.”