Social Security Benefit Payments (Income)

I enter it as a pay check using Q2005. Cash Flow; Banking Activities; Set up Paycheck.

You indicated deductions include Medicare Tax - did you mean Medicare B Premiums'?

Here is a link to one previous thread. Search on 'social security income' will give you quite a few more hits.

Hi, Pat.

Yes, it's very much "like a simple pay statement split deposit".

My check is automatically deposited on the second Wednesday of each month. This system changed just about the time my SS benefits began in the year

2000. Earlier retirees got their checks on the 3rd day of each month. New retirees get paid on a new schedule; I don't know the "formula", but it somehow relates to the payee's birthdate, and mine is the 10th day of January. Since my wife's benefit is based on my account, her payday is the same as mine. For the past couple of years, Quicken has provided a "second Wednesday" option for scheduling the income in the Calendar, so that we no longer have to adjust the day each month.

Note that the deduction for Medicare is not a tax, but an insurance premium. Medicare Part A coverage (for hospitalization) is automatic and not shown separately anywhere. Medicare Part B (for doctors, etc.) is optional and is deducted from the benefit payment. Everybody that I know has opted for Part B coverage. The amount has increased with inflation each year; for 2007, the premium is $93.50 per month for each of us; for 2006 it was $88.50 per month. This premium is deductible as a medical expense on our income tax return. See the thread JM mentions for further discussion of the tax effects of all this.

My scheduled transaction records the deposit into my Checking Account. The Split records the gross amount to a Category named Social Security Income - RCW, and the Medicare premium deduction as a minus to Medicare Insurance:Medicare Part B - RCW. (My wife's checks go to similar accounts for her.) If I elected voluntary income tax withholding, I would add another split as a minus and send it to my FIT Prepaid Account. This, of course, is not an expense, but a prepayment of income taxes that may or may not be due next April.

I don't recall whether these Categories were in Quicken by default or if I added them. I suspect that at least the benefits category was there because Help describes this as "Net social security benefits for taxpayer reported on Form SSA-1099." It obviously should be the gross benefits, because that's what must be reported by the taxpayer. The SSA-1099 reports both gross and net amounts, as well as the Medicare premiums and income tax prepayments that have been deducted.

The good news is that this has to be done just once to start, then adjusted in December each year to reflect the coming year's inflation-adjusted amounts to begin in January.

RC

Hi, again...

Not that it matters, but...

My birthday is the 10th of JULY.

RC

That's OK, RC, as we go on in life us codg.. uh!... geez... UH!.... better, more experienced and wiser selves often ADD to our age rather than succumb to the vanities of frail, inexperienced youth.

Power to us!

Jay

This is the schedule they use to send out the checks.

Steve

Birth date on Benefits paid on 1st - 10th Second Wednesday 11th - 20th Third Wednesday 21st - 31st Fourth Wednesday

Thanks everyone, with special thanks to RC for his complete explanation. Pat

222 14936 body Thanks everyone, with special thanks to RC for his complete explanation. Pat

Along w/RC's excellent explanation -- I add a class to each split transaction, 1 for spouse 1 for me (example /pjss or /djss). With classes added everything imports to TurboTax w/o problems.