Use Your Extra Day to Leap into Retirement

By Alan Edwards, Social Security Public Affairs Specialist

It’s leap year and that means one thing — you can add one extra calendar day to your February schedule. Many people are preparing for the upcoming elections. Others might be getting a jump on spring cleaning. What will you do with your extra day?

You could use a few of your extra minutes to check out what Social Security offers at  www.socialsecurity.gov/onlineservices. There, you can:

• Apply for retirement, disability, and other benefits;
• Get your Social Security Statement;
• Appeal a recent medical decision about your disability claim;
• Find out if you qualify for benefits;

If you’re planning or preparing for retirement, you can spend a fraction of your extra 24 hours at my Social Security. In as little as 15 minutes, you can create a safe and secure my Social Security account. More than 21 million Americans already have accounts. In fact, someone opens one about every 6 seconds. Join the crowd and sign up today at www.socialsecurity.gov/myaccount. With a personalized my Social Security account, you can:

• Obtain an instant, personalized estimate of your future Social Security benefits;
• Verify the accuracy of your earnings record — your future benefit amounts are based on your earnings record;
• Change your address and phone number, if you receive monthly Social Security benefits;
• Sign up for or change direct deposit of your Social Security benefits;
• Get a replacement SSA-1099 or SSA-1042S for tax season; and
• Obtain a record of the Social Security and Medicare taxes you’ve paid.

And if you have a little time to spare, you can always check out our blog, Social Security Matters, at blog.socialsecurity.gov. There, you will find guest posts by Social Security experts, in-depth articles, and answers to many of your questions about retirement, benefits, and healthcare. Each post is tagged by topic so you can easily search for what matters most to you.

Leaping from webpage to webpage, you can easily see that Social Security has you covered all year long, not just on that extra day in February. Remember, you can access our homepage that links to our wide array of online services any day of the— at www.socialsecurity.gov.

For additional tools, go to http://www.aarp.org/work/social-security/