A surviving spouse who watched SSIA vanish from the DFAS statement could reasonably conclude a benefit was taken away. The opposite happened: SSIA was a partial patch for the SBP-DIC offset, and when Congress finished repealing that offset on January 1, 2023, the full SBP annuity took its place. If the total monthly amount went down after 2022 instead of up, something is wrong and DFAS needs a call.
Background
The Special Survivor Indemnity Allowance (SSIA) was a Department of Defense allowance that patched part of the SBP-DIC offset while Congress was repealing it. SSIA paid surviving spouses a flat monthly amount to offset the dollar-for-dollar reduction of their Survivor Benefit Plan annuity. When Congress fully repealed the SBP-DIC offset effective January 1, 2023, the patch was no longer needed. SSIA ended with it: the last SSIA payment was the January 3, 2023 payment, which covered December 2022.
Many surviving spouses received SSIA between 2008 and 2022 and now wonder why it disappeared. This article walks through what SSIA was, how it was calculated, why it ended, and what should appear in its place.
This is educational. For your specific situation, contact DFAS Retired and Annuitant Pay.
What SSIA was
SSIA was a flat monthly payment to surviving spouses whose SBP annuity was being reduced by Dependency and Indemnity Compensation. It was created by section 644 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008 (Public Law 110-181) and was paid by DFAS, the Defense Finance and Accounting Service.
The math was straightforward. Congress set monthly SSIA amounts in statute, beginning at $50 per month for fiscal year 2009 and increasing over time. The scheduled amount reached $150 for fiscal year 2014, then $200 for fiscal year 2015, $275 for fiscal year 2016, and $310 for months from October 2016 through November 2018. Later, SSIA continued with cost of living adjustments while the SBP DIC offset was phased out. The maximum SSIA amount was $327 beginning in January 2021 and $346 beginning in January 2022, although some survivors could receive less depending on the remaining SBP DIC offset:
- Fiscal year 2009: $50 per month
- Fiscal year 2014: $150
- Fiscal year 2015: $200
- Fiscal year 2016: $275
- October 2016 through November 2018: $310
- January 2021: $327 maximum
- January 2022: $346 maximum
SSIA was paid in addition to the partial SBP annuity that survived the offset, and in addition to DIC.
Source rules:
- 10 USC 1450(m), part of 10 U.S.C. Chapter 73 (the SSIA authority; still on the books, but SSIA is no longer payable now that the offset is gone)
- 10 U.S.C. Chapter 73, sections 1447 to 1455 (the Survivor Benefit Plan statute)
- DoD Financial Management Regulation, Volume 7B (DFAS pay rules for SBP and SSIA)
Why SSIA existed in the first place
Before Congress acted, a surviving spouse eligible for both SBP and DIC saw the SBP annuity reduced dollar-for-dollar by the DIC amount. For many spouses this left the SBP check at zero, because DIC alone exceeded what SBP would have paid. SSIA was a partial cash patch.
The original 2008 act set SSIA at $50, with annual increases that Congress controlled directly. SSIA was always intended as a placeholder, not a permanent solution.
The phased repeal of the SBP-DIC offset
Section 622 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 (P.L. 116-92), widely known as the repeal of the "widow's tax", phased out the offset over three years:
- 2021: the SBP annuity was reduced by no more than two-thirds of the DIC amount, instead of the full DIC amount.
- 2022: the SBP annuity was reduced by no more than one-third of the DIC amount.
- January 1, 2023: full repeal. No offset at all. SBP and DIC paid in full alongside each other.
When the offset was fully repealed, SSIA was no longer patching anything. DFAS explains it the same way: prior to 2023, spouses affected by the SBP DIC offset also received SSIA, and the offset was eliminated effective January 1, 2023. Surviving spouses now receive the full SBP annuity that the retiree elected, plus full DIC, with no offset and no patch.
What surviving spouses should see now
The SBP annuity statement from DFAS should show the full elected amount. The DIC payment from VA should be unchanged. SSIA should be zero (or absent from the statement entirely).
A surviving spouse who is still seeing SSIA on a 2023 or later DFAS statement, or whose SBP is showing a reduced amount in 2023 and after, should:
- Pull the most recent DFAS Retired and Annuitant Pay statement.
- Compare to the retiree's original SBP election (typically 55 percent of the base amount).
- Contact DFAS Retired and Annuitant Pay if the SBP amount is less than the original elected amount.
DFAS phone: 1-800-321-1080. Online portal: myPay.
A sequence survivors sometimes overlook
SBP does not cover retirees only. When a member dies on active duty in the line of duty, the surviving spouse receives an SBP annuity automatically under 10 USC 1448(d), and certain line of duty deaths during inactive duty training are covered under 10 USC 1448(f). Those survivors faced the same SBP-DIC offset as retiree survivors, and they received SSIA on the same terms.
A surviving spouse of a veteran who was not a military retiree and whose death was not an in service line of duty death has no SBP at all. SSIA never applied to them, and the SBP-DIC offset never reduced anything. They receive DIC from VA only.
Surviving spouses whose SBP came from a retiree's election, or from an in service line of duty death, saw the historical sequence:
- 2008 to 2020: full SBP-DIC offset, with SSIA as partial patch.
- 2021: offset reduced by one-third. SBP partially restored. SSIA maximum of $327 from January 2021.
- 2022: offset reduced by two-thirds. SBP further restored. SSIA maximum of $346 from January 2022.
- 2023 onward: SBP and DIC paid in full. SSIA sunset.
Two edge cases from the offset years
Remarriage after age 57. A small group of surviving spouses was already receiving full SBP and full DIC years before the 2023 repeal. In Sharp v. United States (Federal Circuit, 2009), the court held that when a surviving spouse's DIC entitlement arises from remarriage after age 57, the SBP annuity cannot be offset by DIC. DFAS applied that ruling from 2009 onward, so those spouses received both benefits in full, without SSIA, while everyone else waited for the phased repeal.
The optional child annuity ended the same day. Before the repeal, a surviving spouse of a member who died in the line of duty could direct the SBP annuity to a dependent child, because a child's annuity was not reduced by DIC. The FY2020 NDAA ended that option along with the offset: effective January 1, 2023, the optional annuity for dependent children was eliminated and the annuity reverted by law to the eligible surviving spouse, with the first reverted payment on the February 1, 2023 payday. DFAS required eligible spouses to submit paperwork to complete the reversion. How the survivor programs sit alongside each other is covered in Survivor benefit dependencies.
Common misunderstandings
- SSIA was never the same as DIC. SSIA was a DoD payment to patch the SBP-DIC offset. DIC is a VA payment for the death of a veteran whose death was service connected (or, under 38 USC 1318, whose service connected disability was rated totally disabling for the qualifying period before death).
- SSIA sunset does NOT mean SBP was reduced. SBP increased. SSIA disappeared because the underlying offset that justified it was repealed.
- A surviving spouse who never had SBP (because the retiree declined it, or because the veteran was neither a retiree with SBP nor a member who died in the line of duty) had no SSIA either. The full repeal of the offset has no effect on a surviving spouse who never had SBP.
- If you are seeing a smaller monthly DFAS statement in 2023 or later than in 2022, something is wrong. Contact DFAS.
Sources
- 10 USC 1450 (SBP statute, including the now-repealed offset)
- 10 USC 1450(m) (SSIA authority, within 10 U.S.C. Chapter 73)
- 38 USC 1311 (DIC rates)
- Section 622 of the FY2020 National Defense Authorization Act, P.L. 116-92
- Section 644 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008, P.L. 110-181 (created SSIA)
- DFAS Retired and Annuitant Pay, SBP-DIC News (1-800-321-1080)
- Sharp v. United States (Federal Circuit, 2009), on the SBP-DIC offset and remarriage after age 57
- DFAS, 2023 SBP Optional Child Annuity Reversion guidance
Related articles
- SBP open enrollment: the enrollment window decisions this history feeds into.
- Survivor benefit dependencies: the full picture of how the survivor programs interact.