Larry, my husband is 55 years of age and has been collecting Social Security Disability benefits for about 6 years now. He told me recently that he was notified by SSA that he earned too much, because he held a part-time job as supplement income, and may have to pay the excess earnings back. I'm very concerned about how his situation will affect my future earnings, if at all. We've been married almost 28 years, so I've surpassed the 10 year threshold. I should be able to draw from his benefit as the higher wage earner, but I'm not certain how the l news will affect us. Please provide your insight and thank you for allowing me to, "Ask Larry. "

Hi,

There are limits on how much a person can earn and still be considered to be disabled and eligible for Social Security disability (SSDI) benefits. If a person's earnings exceed those limits, their SSDI benefits may be suspended or terminated. And, if Social Security wasn't immediately aware of a person's earnings and as a result pays benefits for a period of time when a person's SSDI should have been suspended or terminated, the person involved is expected to repay any overpayment of benefits.

Your husband could appeal Social Security's determination that he's been overpaid, or he could ask for the overpayment to be waived (i.e. forgiven). In order to qualify for waiver of his overpayment, your husband would have to be determined to not have been at fault in causing the overpayment, and he would have to be financially unable to repay the overpayment.

If your husband doesn't repay the overpayment and if the overpayment isn't waived, it will stay on his record and Social Security will seek to recover the overpayment from his future benefit payments. If Social Security is unable to recover the overpayment from your husband's benefits, they could try to collect any outstanding overpayment by withholding any spousal benefits that you qualify for in the future. However, if recovery from your spousal benefits is proposed, you could also file a request for waiver of the overpayment. Social Security could not recover your husband's overpayment from any benefits that you are entitled to based on your own earnings, though.

Best, Jerry