Colorado Man fighting to restart social security payments after being declared deadly – San Diego Union -Tribune

When Alex Vukovich noticed that his January social security check suddenly disappeared from his account, the bank had an unusual explanation.

According to the federal government, Vukovich was dead.

More than a month later, the Aurora man still fights to restore his checks, and does not seem to have a clear answer on the question of whether the social Security Administration acknowledges that he did not join the Chéries.

His bank returned the $ 1,928 he had withdrawn from his account after visiting a branch and proven that he was still alive, said Vukovich. But he did not receive his February check and do not know if the March will come.

“I am lucky because I have enough savings to compensate,” he said.

Social Security Administration estimated that less than 0.33% of the 3.1 million death reports it receives each year requires corrections. Most reports come from states, but family members, funeral salons, federal agencies and financial institutions report certain deaths, he said.

If someone suspects that they were wrongly dead, he should go to his local social security office with at least one form of current identification, the agency said.

“Social Security takes immediate measures to correct our files and we can provide a letter that the error has been corrected which can be shared with other organizations,” the agency said in a statement, refusing to respond specifically to the Vukovich situation.

Social Security Administration distributes approximately 1.3 billion of dollars per year in retirement benefits to around 59 million Americans who paid the system during their years of work.

After noticing that the money of his 2010s was missing on January 22, Vukovich said he had spent about three hours waiting with Social Security to inform them of the error. The person to the customers with whom he spoke said that the most likely explanation was that someone had made a hit when he signals the death of another person.

An employee of the Aurora Social Security office said that Vukovich would receive his next check on February 26, so he assumed that they would have solved the problem and would have notified his health insurance company and credit card issuers that he was still very alive.

He then received a letter on February 25 which said that he had received an overpayer in January and would not get a check for Feborary. This sparked another call for social security administration and another expectation of several hours. The person with whom he spoke could not explain what had gone wrong, but said that the funds would appear in his account in 24 to 48 hours.

“I was totally surprised that it was still not repaired,” he said.

But the money was still not there on Monday. He recalled again and the customer service representative recommended that he visit the Aurora office. After about two hours online, an employee told him that the computer system showed that he was alive, but he should make an appointment in person before being able to send his checks. The next available meeting was not on March 14.

Since the end of January, Vukovich said he had spoken to nine people in local or national social security offices, which had told him that they had solved the problem. He is not sure of what is wrong, but suspects that the dismissals widespread in the federal government do not help. The administration of social value has not yet made large cuts, but announced on Friday that it would dismiss 7,000 people.

“Now, I’m worrying if I’m going to get my walk or April check,” he said.

Originally published: March 4, 2025 at 11:42 a.m. PST