{"id":12162,"date":"2025-03-22T01:48:20","date_gmt":"2025-03-22T01:48:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/?p=12162"},"modified":"2025-03-22T01:48:20","modified_gmt":"2025-03-22T01:48:20","slug":"2026-cola-estimate-and-recovering-overpayments-csrs-fers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/?p=12162","title":{"rendered":"2026 COLA Estimate and Recovering Overpayments CSRS, FERS"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\"Cost<\/p>\n

A model of estimating the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for retirees points to a 2.2% COLA increase for 2026, down from an estimated 2.5% a month ago.<\/p>\n

The Senior Citizen\u2019s League\u2019s (TSCL) most recent prediction is 0.3 percentage points lower than last year\u2019s COLA of 2.5 percent.<\/p>\n

SEE ALSO:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The 2025 federal retiree cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) was 2.5 percent for those under the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) and 2.0 percent for those under the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS).<\/p>\n

Each month, TSCL issues a new prediction of the next COLA for Social Security using our statistical model. \u201cOur model incorporates the Consumer Price Index, the Federal Reserve interest rate, and the national unemployment rate to make its predictions,\u201d TSCL says.<\/p>\n

The official 2026 COLA will be released by the Social Security Administration (SSA) in mid-October 2025.\u00a0 <\/strong>The SSA will calculate the percent change between average prices in the third quarter of the current year (ending on Sept. 30) with the third quarter of the previous year.<\/p>\n

Overpaid Social Security Benefits<\/h2>\n

The Trump administration announced a new policy to increase the Social Security Administration\u2019s (SSA) efforts to collect overpaid Social Security benefits. Starting on March 27th, seniors receiving accidental overpayments will have 100 percent of their future benefits withheld until they\u2019ve paid back all taxpayer money.<\/p>\n

It is reported that the SSA collected an average of $4.2 billion in overpayments per year from fiscal years 2017 to 2023.\u00a0 The agency also ran an average balance of $22.8 billion in uncollected overpayments during the same period.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government could send seniors a check worth an expected $495 if it recovered its entire overpaid benefits balance in a typical year, according to a TSCL analysis.\u00a0 \u201cAfter that, suppose the government continued paying back recovered overpayments as a dividend to retirees,\u201d TSCL said. \u201cIn that case, we\u2019d then expect it to be able to increase seniors\u2019 benefits by an average of $77 in a typical year.\u201d<\/p>\n

TCSL believes the government should consider giving seniors more time to return overpaid benefits before it starts withholding Social Security checks. Social Security beneficiaries currently have 30 days from being notified of being overpaid to return the funds before the government begins withholding benefits. The Social Security Overpayment Act, which was introduced in the previous Congress but failed to pass, would extend this window to 120 days and provide valuable relief for seniors.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile The Senior Citizen\u2019s League (TSCL) believes overpayments on Social Security benefits should be recouped, we feel it\u2019s important that beneficiaries not face undue pressure from an immediate 100 percent reduction in benefits, \u201d said TSCL Executive Director Shannon Benton.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Senior Citizens League<\/a> supported the Social Security Overpayment Act in the previous Congress. Had it passed, the bill would have extended the time for the SSA to begin withholding benefits from 30 days to 120 days after notifying a beneficiary of an overpayment.\u00a0 The clawback of payments is especially unfair to seniors who do not have external support to help manage their finances and track their benefits. Many beneficiaries may not be aware of an overpayment and could suddenly find themselves without a check. The time between notification and recoupment should be extended, and we hope that some members of Congress will have the courage to reintroduce the Social Security Overpayment Fairness Act.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A model of estimating the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for retirees points to a 2.2% COLA increase for 2026, down from an estimated 2.5% a month ago. The Senior Citizen\u2019s League\u2019s (TSCL) most recent prediction is 0.3 percentage points lower than last year\u2019s COLA of 2.5 percent. SEE ALSO: The 2025 federal retiree cost-of-living adjustment (COLA)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6237,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[348],"tags":[840,838,5015,839,5014,5016],"class_list":{"0":"post-12162","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-retirement","8":"tag-cola","9":"tag-csrs","10":"tag-estimate","11":"tag-fers","12":"tag-overpayments","13":"tag-recovering"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}