When you move abroad, you expect some red tape. Visas, taxes, and bank accounts are the standard dragon quests of expat life. But once you’re settled in, you’d think the basics would stay … well, basic.
Kristie and I made that exact assumption when we moved, confident that our previous experience had prepared us. After all, we didn’t have any problems establishing ourselves with the US Social Security Administration in Portugal when updating our records or setting up remote banking for payment deposits.
But that was five years ago, and as we all know there have been some changes recently. Staff has been cut, services have been reduced, and some new hoops and hurdles have been introduced.
When we moved to Spain, all we needed to do was update two simple things with Social Security:
- Our new mailing address in Valencia, and
- Kristie’s direct deposit information (from the Portuguese bank to a Spanish one)
You’d think this would be a quick online task, the digital equivalent of scribbling a note on a form and being done with it.
What followed was two months of bureaucratic loop-de-loops, involving ID verification calls, an elusive embassy office, a Reddit tip that changed everything, and finally, 181 minutes of mind-melting hold music.
And then the January payment didn’t show up.
Step One: Enter the ID.ME Twilight Zone
The first thing we discovered was that there is a new process for logging into the SSA website. You now need to authenticate through ID.ME, which is a private identity verification service that’s … well, let’s say not optimized for people living abroad.
The process involved uploading documents, attempting digital selfies, and eventually scheduling video calls with live representatives to prove that we are, in fact, the same humans whose documents we just submitted.
More interestingly, Kristie and I – married, living in the same house, dealing with the same issue – had to book separate video calls. There was no option to do it together. Because of course there wasn’t. Why offer efficiency when you can double the fun and halve the logic?
So, we each had our own awkward virtual appointment, holding up passports, answering the same questions, and pretending not to hear the sound of our own sanity cracking ever so slightly.
Eventually, miraculously, we got in. We logged into the SSA site.
We clicked “Change Address.”
We clicked “Change Bank Info.”
“This information cannot be updated on the Social Security site. This change must be handled through your local field office.”
Naturally.
Step Two: Now You Work With Madrid. Good Luck!
All overseas SSA matters for people in Spain are managed by the Federal Benefits Unit (FBU) at the U.S. Embassy in Madrid.
No online tools. No web forms. No “submit here” button.
Just a very specific process involving:
- A single email address that apparently lives in a black hole
- A phone line that is only open two days a week, for three hours at a time
- A distinct air of “we’ll get to you when we get to you”
We emailed. No response. We called. No answer. We called again. We emailed again. We spent hours at a time trying to get through on a perpetually busy phone line.
It took a full month and more persistence than I care to admit before we finally reached a real person.
Once we did, everything was fine. The representative at the FBU was pleasant and helpful. Our addresses were updated, the banking information was switched over to Spain, and Kristie’s December payment arrived right on schedule.
Cue cautious optimism.
Step Three: The January Surprise
And then January happened.
No deposit.
No notice. No email. No red flag waving in the corner of the screen.
Just a quiet, unsettling line in Kristie’s SSA account:
Status: Suspended
That’s it. No explanation. No alerts. No indication of what went wrong. The payment simply didn’t arrive, and her account was in bureaucratic purgatory.
Step Four: Into the Hold Music Abyss
So, we decided to call the SSA. Simple enough, right?
Well, no.
The SSA lists only a U.S. 800 number, which isn’t toll-free from Europe. Worse, it often just doesn’t connect. For two straight days, we got nothing but “circuits are busy” messages.
Finally, buried deep in a Reddit forum for expats, we found a tip:
“Try calling from a US-based VOIP number. Sometimes the 800 line only works if it thinks you’re in country.”
We dusted off our old VOIP line with a U.S. number and gave it a try.
Miracle. It rang.
The automated voice gave us an estimated wait time: 110 minutes.
“OK,” we thought. “We’ve made it this far. We can wait.”
Actual time on hold: 181 minutes.
That’s three hours of hold music. Actually, that’s being generous; it was just eight bars of the same melody, looping endlessly. The kind of loop that breaks people. I hear it in my sleep. It’s been days and I can still hum it. If anyone wants to create a remix called “SSA Lo-Fi Chill Beats to Lose Sanity To,” I’ll contribute the melody.
Step Five: The Mysterious Code F9
When we finally got through, the SSA rep confirmed the account was flagged with Suspension Code F9.
I asked what that meant.
It means ‘Suspended: No specified reason.’
Ah. Of course. The mystic F9. The final boss of bureaucratic vagueness.
Eventually, the rep located a vague note. Apparently, some contact information was missing on Kristie’s account, although no details were provided. The only way to fix it?
“You’ll need to contact the Federal Benefits Unit in Madrid.”
Yes. Them again.
Step Six: Back to the Embassy (Literally)
We tried calling the FBU again. Predictably, nothing after three hours of redialing.
So now we’ve made an in-person appointment at the U.S. Embassy in Madrid for January 20.
I’ll try by phone again next week, but if that doesn’t work (and I am not optimistic), we’ll take the train for two hours each way just to tell someone, face to face, that their system suspended Kristie’s benefits without notice, without cause, and with no obvious way to fix it.
We’ll pack snacks, bring every printed document we can think of, and perhaps light a candle in honor of the gods of administrative systems.
Will the embassy be able to resolve the issue? Will the January payment arrive eventually? Will the hold music ever stop echoing in my brain?
Stay tuned for Part Two: The Embassy Strikes Back.
To Be Continued…
⚠️ Tips for Fellow Expats Dealing with Social Security from Abroad
- Set up your ID.ME access before you leave the U.S., if you can. Doing it abroad is possible, but not fun.
- Don’t expect the SSA website to let you make changes. Almost everything requires human intervention.
- Keep a VOIP phone number with a U.S. area code. It might be the only way to actually call SSA.
- Be persistent with the Federal Benefits Unit, but also patient. Call first. Then call again. Then keep trying, because persistence is unfortunately part of the process. You can try email, but it took over six weeks for the Madrid FBU to respond to the first message we sent, by which time we had already resolved the issue (or so we thought!).
- Don’t rely on notifications. Check your SSA payments every month and your SSA account online regularly. Suspensions may happen without warning or explanation.
Have you survived your own SSA horror story abroad? Feel free to share it in the comments.
A Modern Odyssey - Expatriates in Iberia 
We, too, have experienced problem after problem with USA Social Security.Not originally, when we first moved to Portugal in 2017.But after Donald Trump’s DOGE made massive cuts.I went through the tedious and repetitive process of completing the ID.me registration.Finally, yay, I completed it (successfully).No matter.When I attempted to access my Social Security site — after all, I had received multiple messages from SSA stating that messages or information were awaiting me — no luck whatsoever:”SYSTEM ERROR”That’s what I got every time I logged in with ID.me and was transferred to the SSA site.So, I emailed a message to SSA, explaining the problem, and emphasizing that I needed help accessing my Social Security site.Two weeks later, I received an email from SSA saying that a message was sent to my SSA site.”Dear Lord,” I asked myself. “Is it me … or them?”This matter remains to be resolved.Meanwhile, my partner had decided to apply for early (62) retirement. As suggested, he applied for his Social in March, two months before his June 2025 birthday. He jumped through all the hoops. But, unlike all his other correspondence about Social Security via the USA’s Lisbon consulate (available only on Wednesdays) which were by email or telephone calls, this time correspondence came through the mails. He was to contact so-and-so on such-and-such a specific date.Alas, we were on vacation.When he hadn’t contacted SSA via the American consulate in Lisbon, it had returned all of his records to the USA. The couldn’t be retrieved. He’d have to start all over again …It’s now mid-January–six months beyond his 62nd birthday and eight months since he had submitted his application as prescribed.Last week he received an official Social Security envelope from the USA. It asked him to review all the information he submitted on intake, especially that he wanted his payments (not benefits!) to begin as of July 2025. If everything was correct, he could file the documents with all of his other vital records. If not, he needed to contact SSA to make the corrections. Who? Where? How? When?Fortunately, everything correct.Except that he, too, gets a “SYSTEM ERROR” message when he attempts to log into his Social Security account online via ID.me.We’re holding our breaths, waiting to see if, when, and how much he’ll receive.
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Have you spoken to the FBU at the embassy? They are probably going to be more helpful than the consulate.
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Only the USA’s consulate — not the embassy to which it is attached — can/will handle Social Security matters.
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The information we received is that the FBU is attached to the embassy and they’re the ones we need to work with for Social Security. Check out https://pt.usembassy.gov/social-security/ – there’s a phone number and email address. You might also be able to schedule an in-person appointment (like we have to do at the embassy in Madrid).
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