My friend receives a pension from her late husband railroad pension. She has been told that she cannot receive her own SS benefits and the RR pension. Is that true?
It seems to me that her own SS benefits should not count against her late husband's RR benefits.

Hi,

That's not exactly true, but she couldn't get both benefits in full. Railroad Retirement (RR) benefits consist of 2 tiers, and tier 1 benefits are offset dollar for dollar by the amount of any Social Security (SS) benefits that the person receives. So, the only way that your friend would likely gain from filing for SS is if her SS benefit rate is higher than her tier 1 RR rate. If she hasn't already done so, your friend should probably check with both Social Security and the Railroad Retirement Board to see if she would gain anything by filing for SS benefits.

Best, Jerry