By Joanne Bump
Most Significant Change in Social Security Administration (SSA) in Years. This change is momentous given the sheer size of the number of beneficiaries affected. According to Forbes, roughly 71 million people are expected to collect Social Security benefits in 2026, as reported by SSA. Starting March 7, 2026, your call to SSA to schedule appointments at your local office will not be picked up by local SSA staff. Instead, it will be answered by a new nationalized customer service system, according to Newsweek. Traditionally, SS beneficiaries needing an appointment or to resolve benefit questions could talk to local SSA staff. This has been replaced by a new system that will route calls to a nationalized appointment and customer service system, according to Newsweek 3-6-26.
The administration says that the new national system will improve customer service through the use of improved technology and making more appointments available during the transition. SSA says it will still provide SS beneficiaries in-person service to more than 1,200 field offices in the U.S.
The feeling among many retired State employees is probably that it was hard enough for us to get our questions answered when we were helped by local SS staff who knew all about our State employee earnings and changes over the years. We could go to the local office even without an appointment, if we wanted to. Many SS beneficiaries are not able to effectively use a new technology-driven customer service system with all the challenges learning to use it in order to get our benefits.
This change is important because it is intended to streamline operations by reducing the number of in-person visits. This change is likely to most directly impact those that call local SSA offices to manage benefit changes, make appointments, or that involve complex claims. About 31.6 million SSA field office visits were made nationwide from October 2024 to October 2025. To increase efficiency, the administration’s goal is to provide 50 percent less visits in fiscal year 2026 compared to fiscal year 2025, or about 15 million field office visits by the public. This is based on a November internal field office operating plan provided by the Associated Press.
But some have reservations about this change. Alex Beene, an instructor for financial literacy for the University of Tennessee at Martin, says this change was driven by significant cuts to SSA staffing last year. The administration laid off at least 7,000 workers as part of its reduction in force plan. Nonetheless, the SSA maintains that its customer service change will not negatively impact SS beneficiaries.
According to Kevin Thompson, CEO of the 9i Capital Group, there are trade-offs. The goal is to use Automated Intelligence (AI) to fill the gaps for the nuanced real-world situation that local SS workers provided to help resolve difficult issues based on their knowledge of state- or regional-specific questions once fielded by local offices. However, this may not always happen. According to Thompson, “You’re no longer dealing with someone who understands your region; you’re dealing with a broader system…Staffing shortages are real. Phone wait times are now stretching past an hour in some cases,” … “While in-person visits may still be relatively quick—around six minutes based on some reports—that’s assuming you can even get in front of someone.” If callers have difficulty getting through to resolve issues, it could impact their monthly benefits. For many retirees, these monthly payments are used for essentials like food, housing, and health care.
SSA Tips Using the New SS National Customer Service System. The SSA has provided some basic suggestions for how to navigate the new system including: Use your online account for most services, be patient and prepared, expect temporary bottlenecks, keep records that document all interaction details, including date, time, and staff ID. Use reliable sources and only trust official information from government sites or verify recent news reports.
In addition, the “Getting Ready for the Social Security National Customer Service System” chart below shows a compilation of ideas on how to prepare for the new SS National Customer Service system from various sources identified by AI.
Nationwide Trends for Medicare Advantage (MA) Plans. State employee retirees included under the defined benefit plan receive the Blue Cross Blue Shield Medicare Advantage (MA) plan, unless they opt out for the traditional Medicare plan. Below we discuss how MA plans are disenrolling plan members. We do not have data on our specific State employees’ retiree MA plan. We are not saying how this trend will affect your State employee health care plan, but understanding the national trends in MA plans may provide you with insight of possible changes that may be coming your way.
Medicare Advantage Disenrollment Trends. The federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) say changes will need to be made to limit the payment growth for MA plans to less than 1 percent in 2027. This is a steep decrease from the 5 percent increase for 2026. CMS says this is needed for payment accuracy and long-term sustainability of the MA plans. However, the American Health Insurance Plans says a flat program funding could result in benefit cuts for seniors when medical costs are increasing significantly while medical care utilization is high. Premium increases and market exits could also result. The mean forced disenrollment rate for MA beneficiaries has increased from 1 percent from 2018-2024 to 6.9 percent in 2025 to 10 percent estimated in 2026. These disenrollment rates may result in a disruption of seniors’ medical care. Millions of SS beneficiaries will need to adjust to changes in their physicians and benefit packages.
(Editor’s Note: Joanne Bump serves as feature columnist for “Retirement Matters.” Column content is time sensitive and is based on information as of 3/8/26. Sources are primarily from non-profit, and government policy research organizations. Joanne can be contacted by e-mail at joannebump@gmail.com.)