Q. Scenario: Age 56 with 23 years of civilian service (and paying into Social Security) here in the federal government. I’m eligible for the early out but here are my questions:
Would I receive the Supplemental Social Security income until I’m 60?
Will there be an incentive (dollar amount) to take this early out?
Would I not be penalized in any way if I take the early out?
How soon would retirement and supplemental payments begin after retiring?
I know in earlier years, there was a substantial monetary amount offered to take an early out.
A. Assuming that you have reached your minimum retirement age, you would be entitled to the special annuity supplement. It would be included in your annuity payment and continue to age 62, not 60, unless you had earnings from wages or self-employment that exceeded the annual Social Security earnings limit. If you haven’t reached your MRA, the SRS wouldn’t begin until you did. Only OPM knows how long it would take for you to be put in interim annuity pay status and finally into full pay status. And only your agency would know if it needed to offer early retirement to its employees (and which ones) and if an incentive was even needed to achieve its goals.
