Well, it's most suspicious and frustrating that no SSA agents are able to say the forms haven't been mailed or explain why they are late or say with certainty when they might be sent. No doubt DOGE has wrought severe dysfunction to SSA and expats are the victims. By the way, I get this from Bing: 

Copilot Answer

The SSA Form 7162 for 2025 has not been mailed yet due to typical delays in the distribution process, which usually begins in May each year.

Mailing Schedule and Delays

• Annual Distribution: The SSA Form 7162, often referred to as the "Are you still alive?" form, is typically mailed out in May. Many recipients have reported not receiving their forms yet, even as late as August 2025. 
   
• Potential Issues: Delays can occur due to various factors, including postal service issues, changes in mailing addresses, or administrative delays within the SSA itself. Some individuals have experienced their forms being lost in the mail or not received at all, leading to temporary suspensions of benefits.

1 hour ago, cusanus said:

Well, it's most suspicious and frustrating that no SSA agents are able to say the forms haven't been mailed or explain why they are late or say with certainty when they might be sent. No doubt DOGE has wrought severe dysfunction to SSA and expats are the victims. By the way, I get this from Bing: 

Copilot Answer

The SSA Form 7162 for 2025 has not been mailed yet due to typical delays in the distribution process, which usually begins in May each year.

Mailing Schedule and Delays

• Annual Distribution: The SSA Form 7162, often referred to as the "Are you still alive?" form, is typically mailed out in May. Many recipients have reported not receiving their forms yet, even as late as August 2025. 
   
• Potential Issues: Delays can occur due to various factors, including postal service issues, changes in mailing addresses, or administrative delays within the SSA itself. Some individuals have experienced their forms being lost in the mail or not received at all, leading to temporary suspensions of benefits.

your vote in action

So what's everyone going to do: wait and see if the form arrives by post (how long are you giving them) or are you mailing in a blank?  Or, is there another option?

24 minutes ago, Galong said:

So what's everyone going to do: wait and see if the form arrives by post (how long are you giving them) or are you mailing in a blank?  Or, is there another option?

I'm waiting. 

I figure if it gets to the point of the second mailing being late that there probably will be some kind of announcement. 

1 hour ago, Galong said:

So what's everyone going to do: wait and see if the form arrives by post (how long are you giving them) or are you mailing in a blank?  Or, is there another option?

Sent this to Manila an hour ago or so, got this, not much of an answer: 
Thank you for contacting the Social Security Administration's Federal Benefits Unit at the U.S. Embassy in Manila. 

The mailing of the Annual Report Forms (SSA-7162 and SSA-7161) for the year 2025 is delayed. We encourage that you regularly visit Service Around the World - Office of Earnings & International Operations for any announcements and updates regarding the annual reporting requirement.

-----------------------------------------------

You are very busy and I don't want to waste your time, but hopefully you can provide some badly needed answers to confused and agitated expats. The 7162 forms from Wilkes-Barre were supposed to be mailed May or early June (SSA website 2025 announcement) as they have for many decades except during the covid pandemic when this was announced. This year there is no announcement or explanation as to why the forms are late. An SSA agent in the states spent a long time searching for a barcode form I sent on 4 July being unaware that the forms weren't sent this year. How could it be that phone reps have no knowledge of the form being sent? Queries via phone to Manila have given conflicting assurances about when the form would be mailed, but the July forecasts turned out false and later ones not believed of course. Some online searches (AI assisted) say the forms will not be mailed in 2025. Is this true or not? Others say that DOGE has fired all 1400 Wilkes-Barre employees. Is that true or not? Can you tell us for certain whether the forms will be mailed or when or if at all and whether benefits will be suspended in Feb 2026? Answers to these questions are only fair to the many thousands who depend on their SS payments. Please try to give us an explanation. If you have time, can you check and see if my own 4 July form with barcode has been received?
 

Don't you like the way Musk and his teenager DOGE engineers slithered out of town just as this was all beginning to crash? They should be made criminally liable for the damage they have done everywhere.

13 hours ago, Pib said:

 

7162's and many other SSA forms/docs are mailed from and returned mailed to the Wilkes Barre Data Operations Center where they are processed.  Early in the year DOGE and GSA placed the Ops Center on a non-core asset list for potential closure/sale...and of course most of it's 1,400 employees being laid off/fired/reassigned. 

 

See below Google AI response and also a news article from the Times-Tribune news paper in Scranton PA for more details.  And with the SSA-wide employee reductions I expect Wilkes Barre has probably been hit hard.

 

 

 

Google AI response....take with a grain of salt.

 

Read below March 2025 news article regarding the Wilkes Barre Operations Center....the place 7162's are mailed from and sent back to.    

 

https://www.thetimes-tribune.com/2025/03/09/our-opinion-communities-deserve-better-than-disorganized-handling-of-potential-building-sales

 

 

 

 

That info and newspaper editorial are from five months ago. So what is the status? Did they fire everybody? Is there even an office and staff there to receive the forms if you mail them?

33 minutes ago, John Drake said:

 

That info and newspaper editorial are from five months ago. So what is the status? Did they fire everybody? Is there even an office and staff there to receive the forms if you mail them?

I have no doubt the Wilkes Barre Data Ops Center is still up and running with lots of remaining employees scared they are losing their jobs and plenty of low morale.  And as mentioned in the article the GSA/SSA removed it from the list of possible closures about week later after HUGE backlash....many facilities across the country on the list were removed....Donald and crew backtracking.  

 

However, I also have no doubt there is a tremendous amount of turmoil going with SSA due to leadership change, DOGE impacts, firings, employee retirements with no replacements,  contract cancellations like printing/mailing contracts,  etc.  Kinda like throwing a flash-bang grenade into a room of people.

2 hours ago, Galong said:

So what's everyone going to do: wait and see if the form arrives by post (how long are you giving them) or are you mailing in a blank?  Or, is there another option?

Like I mentioned earlier I plan to mail a manual 7162 to Wilkes Barre the first week of August.   I mailed it a few days ago.  That's all I can do.   It may or may not be processed as none of us know what SSA leadership has directed customer service and/or FBUs to tell customers.

 

Will now just wait and see if the "delayed bar-coded 7162 mailing" ever occurs as it hard to believe many things coming out of the current regime as govt employees from the top dog to the employees in the trenches (like customer service) are afraid of saying anything that states/implies things are in turmoil at their organization. 

The 7162 mailing was suspended for at least one year during COVID-19 blamed on the unreliability of post offices US and ex-US.

 

... and the distributions were not interrupted.

As of today, the folks at Wilkes-Barre know that any mailing to PO Box 7162/1 is obsolete form/bar code so it is questionable whether they will process it or just send it to the shredder.

19 minutes ago, jerrymahoney said:

As of today, the folks at Wilkes-Barre know that any mailing to PO Box 7162/1 is obsolete form/bar code so it is questionable whether they will process it or just send it to the shredder.

Your reference?

11 minutes ago, Pib said:

Your reference?

It's one or the other unless you have some third alternative.

 

Just now, jerrymahoney said:

It's one or the other unless you have some third alternative.

 

It just the way your earlier post was written that it implied (at least to me) you may have seen some very recent  announcement from SSA, maybe called them, etc., and they said manual 7162s were now obsolete, no longer accepted, waste of time to mail to Wilkes Barre, etc.

 

 

7 minutes ago, Pib said:

It just the way your earlier post was written that it implied (at least to me) you may have seen some very recent  announcement from SSA, maybe called them, etc., and they said manual 7162s were now obsolete, no longer accepted, waste of time to mail to Wilkes Barre, etc.

 

 

OK -- just if they receive PO box 7162 mail today, they know it's not the 2025 form.

 

 

7 minutes ago, Pib said:

It just the way your earlier post was written that it implied (at least to me) you may have seen some very recent  announcement from SSA, maybe called them, etc., and they said manual 7162s were now obsolete, no longer accepted, waste of time to mail to Wilkes Barre, etc.

I believe the "manual" forms are ignored until Jan/Feb if the recipient never got them and has no other choice. A friend was unable to get any government mail to her address in Hang Dong. We managed to get one in 2018 with much hassle, so I used the barcode on that as a template, changed the date on top to the new year, signed and dated current year. It worked fine for the next few years, so if Wilkes-Barre is receiving them, that will work. I understand a blank form cannot be used until Jan/Feb following because the barcode is preferred for processing. Again, the barcode info remains the same year to year. 

1 minute ago, jerrymahoney said:

OK -- just if they receive PO box 7162 mail today, they know it's not the 2025 form.

 

 

Well, they would just know it's not a bar-coded form.  But a manually submitted form would have a mid 2025 date and possibly include remarks from the sender that a manual form is being submitted because the annual bar- coded form is probably lost in the mail/delayed.   I included such a memo and remarks on the manual form I mailed in a few days ago.

 

 

And if/when a bar-coded form arrives I'll complete and send back.

7 minutes ago, cusanus said:

I believe the "manual" forms are ignored until Jan/Feb if the recipient never got them and has no other choice.

That could very well be the case.  

3 hours ago, cusanus said:

Sent this to Manila an hour ago or so, got this, not much of an answer: 
Thank you for contacting the Social Security Administration's Federal Benefits Unit at the U.S. Embassy in Manila. 

The mailing of the Annual Report Forms (SSA-7162 and SSA-7161) for the year 2025 is delayed. We encourage that you regularly visit Service Around the World - Office of Earnings & International Operations for any announcements and updates regarding the annual reporting requirement.

-----------------------------------------------

You are very busy and I don't want to waste your time, but hopefully you can provide some badly needed answers to confused and agitated expats. The 7162 forms from Wilkes-Barre were supposed to be mailed May or early June (SSA website 2025 announcement) as they have for many decades except during the covid pandemic when this was announced. This year there is no announcement or explanation as to why the forms are late. An SSA agent in the states spent a long time searching for a barcode form I sent on 4 July being unaware that the forms weren't sent this year. How could it be that phone reps have no knowledge of the form being sent? Queries via phone to Manila have given conflicting assurances about when the form would be mailed, but the July forecasts turned out false and later ones not believed of course. Some online searches (AI assisted) say the forms will not be mailed in 2025. Is this true or not? Others say that DOGE has fired all 1400 Wilkes-Barre employees. Is that true or not? Can you tell us for certain whether the forms will be mailed or when or if at all and whether benefits will be suspended in Feb 2026? Answers to these questions are only fair to the many thousands who depend on their SS payments. Please try to give us an explanation. If you have time, can you check and see if my own 4 July form with barcode has been received?
 

Wow, could you have written them a longer email?

 

I would have ignored it after the first few sentences. 

 

One could only imagine what your resume must have looked like.

 

 

They are now supposed to read "remarks from the sender"? They may be short-staffed even to get out the 2025 edition.

 

They already know the 2025 form was lost/delayed because it has never been sent.

Its worth noting that there are multiple functions in the form beyond proof of life.

For example in some circumstances your check would be reduced if you report working.

My point is even if they cancel the form entirely this year some people will still need to contact SSA.

 

3 minutes ago, dingdongrb said:

Wow, could you have written them a longer email? I would have ignored it after the first few sentences. One could only imagine what your resume must have looked like.

Don't sweat it, you'd never get a job with the ssa.

2 minutes ago, jerrymahoney said:

They are now supposed to read "remarks from the sender"? They may be short-staffed even to get out the 2025 edition 

They have a Remarks area just for such things...whether they now have the manpower/time for a human to process/read the forms I couldn't say.  Nowadays there are very, very intelligent scanning machines that make humans less needed everyday.

6 minutes ago, Pib said:

They have a Remarks area just for such things...whether they now have the manpower/time for a human to process/read the forms I couldn't say.  Nowadays there are very, very intelligent scanning machines that make humans less needed everyday.

Referring to the link above from Manila FBU:

 

The mailing of the Annual Report Forms (SSA-7162 and SSA-7161) for the year 2025 is delayed. We encourage that you regularly visit Service Around the World - Office of Earnings & International Operations for any announcements and updates regarding the annual reporting requirement.

 

Which to me indicates they could likely care less about last year's edition.

6 minutes ago, jerrymahoney said:

 

Which to me indicates they could likely care less about last year's edition.

Unsure what you mean?  Maybe you mean a bar- coded 7162 from last year?  

11 minutes ago, Pib said:

Unsure what you mean?  Maybe you mean a bar- coded 7162 from last year?  

Yes. They don't care about any form they receive now because it is too late for last year and this year's form has not been mailed to anyone.

 

 

If two have arrived in France, then you know they'll be coming soon everywhere, so time to relax.
 

#11·37m ago

suehrl said: 

Has anyone got theirs already this year?

The two of us in our household both just received our forms this morning in the postal mail, August 4, 2025. The forms are dated July 31, 2025.

 

Letsliveinfrance.com

 

The first evidence one is alive today is that one mailed in the current form. Of course, there's still possibility of fraud but still the easiest machine-checkable bit of evidence is that the submitted form scans to be current.

 

My point is to wait for the newest form. There's thousands of us and we'll know when the mailings start.

7 minutes ago, cusanus said:

If two have arrived in France, then you know they'll be coming soon everywhere, so time to relax.

Thanks.

10 minutes ago, cusanus said:

If two have arrived in France, then you know they'll be coming soon everywhere, so time to relax.
 

#11·37m ago

suehrl said: 

Has anyone got theirs already this year?

The two of us in our household both just received our forms this morning in the postal mail, August 4, 2025. The forms are dated July 31, 2025.

 

Letsliveinfrance.com

 

Wow...4 days from US to France.  About the fastest I ever got any regular 1st class mail from US to Bangkok was around 7 to 9 days.