Mystery benefit?
February 6th, 2026 at 02:07 pmWhen I got home yesterday and pulled the mail out of the box, there was an envelope from the Social Security Administration.
This was not a surprise, since I filed for Medicare Part A recently. I just received my card last week. I thought this was another communication related to that.
But when I opened the envelope, it was a notice related to "Potential Private Retirement Benefit Information" indicating a potential "deferred vested benefit" of over $16k from one of the colleges where I worked that would be a one-time lump sum payment.
The year this was reported to the SSA was 2013. The year I left that job was 2009. While I worked full-time at that college for 6 years (and part-time for 3 years before that), I don't recall anything about deferred vested benefits.
So now I need to call the college HR department and find the retirement Plan Administrator and find out whether this is actually a benefit I am entitled to.