Woman stung by mom's 29-year-old Social Security debt

Scott Johnson, The (Montgomery, Ala.) Advertiser | USATODAY

MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- Michelle Clampit expected financial relief to arrive soon in the form of an income tax refund check. She was counting on it, in fact.

It had been a difficult time recently, and the $5,414 she was expecting to be deposited Feb. 27 is equal to more than a quarter of her annual salary, Clampit said.

But no deposit was made, and when she checked the IRS website to find out what happened, she was referred to the Social Security Administration.

Clampit, who lives in Wetumpka, Ala., said she had no idea she possibly could have owed money to the SSA. After all, she had never received a single Social Security check in her life.

After a visit to a local SSA office, Clampit began to suspect that her identity had been stolen.

Eventually, however, the actual reason for the debt became clear: Social Security payments made to her now-deceased mother 29 years ago.

The loss of income was a difficult blow for Clampit, who said she and her husband live paycheck-to-paycheck and count on tax refunds to pay for such things as vacations and extra clothes for their children.

"Income tax (season) is kind of like poor people season. … That's when most poor people do the things in life that they normally don't get to do," Clampit said.

The tax refund was diverted by way of the Treasury Offset Program, which until recently was not authorized to collect on debts that were more than 10 years old, SSA spokesman BJ Jarrett said.

A law passed in 2008 eliminated the 10-year statute of limitations, and in June 2012, the SSA began to inform people about its intention to collect those older debts, Jarrett said.

So no matter how old the overpayments might be, the SSA can go after those debts and will continue to have the ability to collect old debts without limits.

"We may now collect delinquent overpayments through the Treasury Offset Program, indefinitely," Jarrett stated in an emailed response.

The agency has sent about 185,000 notices to people with debts that are more than 10 years old, Jarrett said.

If there is no answer to the notice after 60 days, the debt is referred to the Treasury Offset Program for Tax Refund Offset, Jarrett said. In other words, the payment is taken directly from the person's tax refund.

Debtors can file waivers at any time if they can show both that they are not at fault and that repayment would deprive them of money necessary for survival or would otherwise be unfair, Jarrett said.

The source of the debt

Clampit's father died in 1972 at the age of 29 when she herself was only 2 years old.

Clampit's mother, Alma Waugh Autery, began receiving Social Security payments to compensate for his death, including payments in the names of Clampit and her brother, who was 5 at the time. It was Autery's primary method of supporting them, Clampit said.

In 1984, when Clampit was 14 years old, she received her mother's permission to marry her 17-year-old boyfriend, Doug Clampit. The two remain married today, 29 years later.

Autery apparently continued to receive Social Security payments in Clampit's name although Clampit's marriage made her no longer eligible for the payments.

Clampit said she believes her mother simply did not know she was no longer eligible to receive those payments.

"My mom was an honest person. She didn't like dishonesty," she said. Autery died in 2004.

Clampit said the SSA told her recently that the payments were for $573 a month and were made from August 1984 to June 1985. The total amount of the debt is $6,229.

She said she had no knowledge of the payments until after she started inquiring into why she didn't receive her tax refund this year. In fact, she didn't even know the size of debt until she asked specifically about it last week.

Clampit said it is "ridiculous" to expect her to pay a 29-year-old debt on an overpayment to her deceased mother that Clampit previously knew nothing about.

"I'm not the one that received these checks. I'm not the one that cashed the checks, and I am the one that is being punished for it, me and my family," said Clampit, who has a 19-year-old daughter and a 12-year-old son.

The weight of the debt

Clampit described her family's financial situation as being "poor enough that you can't pay bills but make just enough that you can't get food stamps."

Clampit said the ordeal she has endured since discovering the debt has been emotionally as well as financially damaging, causing her to miss work and seek counseling.

"I've been in a very deep depression over it," she said.

Clampit already had been dealing with bankruptcy and problems that have arisen from it along with some unrelated family hardships.

"I have been so down about it till my doctor put me out of work for a little just because I had so much to hit my plate at the same time," she said.

Meanwhile, Clampit said, her husband also is affected because he didn't receive his share of the refund on the tax return they filed jointly.

The family can't afford to hire an attorney to help sort out the issue, and Clampit said they do not qualify to receive help from Legal Services Alabama.

Clampit currently is going through the process of trying to prove to the SSA that she meets the waiver criteria and hopes to recover her money entirely and have the debt taken off their records.

"I want them to wipe the slate clear as far as my Social Security number so this does not happen to me again," she said.

Clampit said she hopes to have a resolution and her $5,414 tax refund soon.

"They owe me my money. They unjustly took my money," she said.