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SSA renews two computer matching programs

The Social Security Administration is soliciting comments on two computer matching programs that are set to become effective no sooner than October 17, 2008. The computer matching programs are with the Bureau of the Public Debt (BPD) and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and appear in two separate announcements in the September 17 and September 18, 2008, issues of the Federal Register.

The purpose of the matching program with CMS is to identify Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients who have been admitted to certain public institutions and to identify Special Veterans' Benefits (SVB) beneficiaries who are no longer residing outside of the United States. The program will facilitate benefit reductions required under certain provisions of Title XVI of the Social Security Act for individuals in such institutions and benefit terminations required under certain provisions of Title VIII of the Act for individuals no longer residing outside the United States. The CMS will provide the SSA with electronic files containing skilled nursing facility admission and billing data from its Long-Term Care Minimum Data Set. The SSA then will match the CMS data with SSI and SVB payment information.

The program with the BPD establishes conditions under which the BPD agrees to disclose to the SSA ownership of savings securities to verify an individual's self-certification of eligibility for prescription drug subsidy assistance under the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA). The BPD will match the SSNs on the finder file with the SSNs on its savings-type securities (Series E, EE and I) registration systems. An eligible individual may not have income that exceeds 150 percent of the federal poverty guidelines. The agreement allows the SSA to conduct the match on an annual basis.

For More Information

The Unemployment Insurance Reporter with Social Security provides complete coverage of federal and state unemployment insurance programs, with Social Security, including full-text of laws and regs, court decisions, and administrative rulings. Learn more.