Jim Sutton’s Weblog

I read the October 2008 AARP Bulletin “Ask the Experts” column with great interest.  The final question in that column was from a woman (62) asking about receiving spousal benefits from her husband’s account (the husband was 64) while he continued to work.

The answer published in that column was as follows: “Yes, it is possible for a worker to sign up for Social Security and immediately ask to have the payment delayed until the year he wants to start receiving benefits.  This would allow you to receive the spousal benefit now while your husband, by suspending his payment, continues to allow the value of his future benefit to grow.”

This seemed to contradict information I previously received in a meeting at the Social Security office, which is detailed in an earlier post.  So, I called up Social Security and asked them about the apparent difference.

The agent with whom I spoke said that they had received a number of calls about the AARP article and that the response in the “Ask the Experts” column was largely incorrect (and specifically incorrect in the situation as stated).

The agent said that spousal benefits were only available when the other spouse had “retired” (i.e., started receiving benefits from Social Security), and that the deferral scheme would not work unless the primary spouse had already reached full retirement age (as defined by Social Security).  This, of course, is not the case as postulated in the question.

So, one can only get spousal benefits if the other spouse has already started drawing Social Security benefits or is beyond “full retirement age” and either draws Social Security benefits or files to draw and then defers benefits.

This might be a good strategy if the primary wage earner continues to work past full retirement age and the spouse chooses to draw spousal benefits before reaching full retirement age, but the strategy suggested in the AARP Bulletin appears not to work if the primary benficiary is under full retirement age and not actually collecting benefits.