{"id":17281,"date":"2025-09-12T04:20:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T04:20:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/17281\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T04:20:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T04:20:07","slug":"big-change-is-coming-for-social-security-recipients-at-the-end-of-september","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/17281\/","title":{"rendered":"Big Change Is Coming for Social Security Recipients at the End of September"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier this year, President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing federal agencies to stop issuing paper checks. The mandate, which affects the Internal Revenue Service, Department of Education, Department of Veterans Affairs, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/dxtadaptado.com\/en\/paralympic-sports-history-disciplines-and-global-growth-toward-la28\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Social Security Administration<\/a>, takes effect Sept. 30, 2025.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cReducing paper checks has been a longstanding bipartisan goal that our administration is finally putting into action,\u201d Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement. \u201cThanks to President Trump, this will help reduce fraud and theft. It will also remove delays that prevent hardworking Americans from receiving their vital payments.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Why the switch is happening<\/p>\n<p>According <a href=\"https:\/\/www.al.com\/news\/2025\/09\/big-change-is-coming-for-social-security-recipients-at-the-end-of-september.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">AL<\/a>, the government cites cost savings and security as the primary reasons. Mailing a paper check costs about 50 cents, compared to 15 cents for an electronic transfer. In addition, paper checks are reported to be 16 times more likely to be lost or stolen.<\/p>\n<p>Currently, about 0.8% of Social Security beneficiaries \u2014 roughly 500,000 recipients \u2014 still receive paper checks. Everyone else is already enrolled in direct deposit or prepaid debit card programs.<\/p>\n<p>What to do if you still get a paper check<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re part of this small group, you\u2019ll need to switch to electronic payment before Sept. 30. Here are your options:<\/p>\n<p>Call the Social Security Administration directly for instructions on enrolling in direct deposit.<br \/>\nEnroll online at GoDirect.gov.<br \/>\nCall the Electronic Payment Solution Center at 1-800-967-6857 (Monday \u2013 Friday, 9 a.m.\u20137 p.m. ET).<\/p>\n<p>For those without a bank account, the government recommends:<\/p>\n<p>Opening an account through <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fdic.gov\/getbanked\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">FDIC\u2019s Get Banked<\/a> or MyCreditUnion.gov.<br \/>\nSigning up for the Direct Express\u00ae Debit Mastercard\u00ae, a Treasury-sponsored prepaid card that allows beneficiaries to receive monthly payments securely.<\/p>\n<p>If you already receive direct deposit<\/p>\n<p>No action is required. Your benefits will continue as usual without interruption.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Earlier this year, President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing federal agencies to stop issuing paper checks.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17282,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[138,246,111,139,69,244,245],"class_list":["post-17281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-finance","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}