I want to apply for social security when I turn 68 on April 24. Birth year 1950. I want to get the optimum increase in payment for waiting two years after 66. What date do I sign up to receive my payment? April, May June?

Hi,

To qualify for 24 months of delayed retirement credits (DRC), you would choose to start benefits effective with April. However, you will initially only receive credit for the DRCs earned through December 2017 (i.e. 21 months). You would then be due a recomputation effective with your payment for January 2019 to give you credit for the remaining 3 months (January - March 2018). Social Security does those types of recomputations on an automated basis, and my understanding is that they only do them every other year. So, it may be as late as the latter part of 2020 before you actually see the increase. Social Security will pay you any back pay due retroactively to January 2019, though.

As far as when to file, you could file your application any time between now and October 31 2018 and still be able to choose April 2018 as your month of entitlement. By the way, my answers are based on the assumption that you haven't already filed for and suspended your benefits.

Before filing, you may want to consider using our maximization software to see if you have better options available to you.

Best, Jerry