Social Security

Consent must be captured in accordance with the requirements SSA will set forth in the User Agreement. SSA will require consent be captured (1) on a properly-signed SSA-89, Authorization for SSA to Release SSN Verification in either paper format, fillable-PDF or other electronic format, or (2) in some other electronic process consistent with the permitted entity’s existing business process and SSA’s Privacy Act-compliant template language, provided in the eCBSV User Agreement. Moreover, SSA’s signature – including electronic signature requirements will be set forth on SSA’s website and incorporated by reference into the User Agreement.

The eCBSV user must retain the signed consent for a period of five (5) years from the date of the verification request in its original format.

Every permitted entity selected will pay a portion of the 50 percent of the program startup costs, and an initial administrative fee of $3,693. SSA will apply all program startup costs collected to each permitted entity’s annual tier-based subscription fee each year until recouped by the permitted entity.

The permitted entities participating in the initial rollout may be charged additional costs at rollout, if their initial contribution was not sufficient to cover their selected tier-based transactions charge. Again, this is dependent upon the number of permitted entities selected, the estimated annual transaction volumes, and the associated costs at the time of rollout.

Permitted entities selected for the small rollout will be required to submit their prorated portion of the estimated 50 percent startup costs once they are notified by SSA.  Prior to rollout in June 2020, the permitted entity will be required to submit the annual subscription fee for their transaction tier selected plus administrative fees as necessary, if greater than their initial 50 percent program startup costs contribution (see previous FAQ).

The annual subscription fee includes the remaining 50 percent startup costs plus other costs the agency will incur for eCBSV services.  The permitted entity will not be expected to submit any other fees beyond these noted here for their first year of enrollment. 

The subscription fees will be announced in a Federal Register Notice this fall. The Notice will explain the fees in detail.

Once a permitted entity selects a tier level in either the initial or expanded rollout, executes a reimbursable agreement, and pays the tier level fee, no refunds will be provided. Therefore, they cannot drop to a lower volume tier during any 365-day period. They can move up a tier level by starting a new agreement with a new 365-day period. They can also select a lower tier in the following year.

General information on pay.gov can be found on their website at https://www.pay.gov/public/home. If you are selected as an initial rollout participant, SSA will connect to Pay.gov to generate a bill for you from Pay.gov. It will provide specific instructions. Credit cards will be accepted for up to $24,999.99, and ACH can be accepted for any dollar amount. There are no fees associated with using Pay.gov.

The estimated fee range is for the entire “transaction band”. In other words, once we finalize the fees, there will be one fee for each transaction range to include any volume within that range.

If you are an individual permitted entity selected for the eCBSV initial rollout in June 2020, we will terminate your CBSV User Agreement as of that date and you will no longer be a CBSV customer.  We will provide you a refund of unused CBSV funds at that time.

If you are a service provider permitted entity selected for the eCBSV initial rollout in June 2020, you may remain enrolled in CBSV to service non-permitted entities or during the initial rollout, other permitted entities beyond the 20 limited in the initial rollout.

If you are not selected for the eCBSV initial rollout, you will continue as a CBSV customer and must adhere to all requirements in the CBSV User Agreement.

The substantial difference between CBSV and eCBSV is that the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, Section 215, Reducing Identity Fraud, requires SSA to confirm (or not confirm) to a "permitted entity" the validity of fraud protection data (specific information about an individual, including SSN verification) based on the individual's written consent, including by electronic signature.  An SSN verification is verification that a name, SSN, and date of birth combination matches (or does not match) our records.  The legislation requires SSA to improve our current verification system to accommodate the much larger anticipated volume of users and verifications as a result of now allowing consumer consent to be received electronically.  In addition, the Act defines permitted entities use of eCBSV for specific uses as outlined in the Act.  Therefore, for entities that do not qualify as a permitted entity, or entities who use the SSN verification for purposes outside of the Act will continue to obtain a number holder’s wet signature on the consent forms and use the current CBSV at this time.

SSA has made selections for the initial rollout of eCBSV. Each company selected must complete a reimbursable agreement and pay their portion of the 50 percent program startup costs to be fully enrolled. If any company selected opts not to complete the agreement and payment, SSA will select another company to replace them in the initial rollout. Therefore, we must wait until all selected companies finalize their enrollment before we can notify you of your status. We anticipate completing the enrollments by November 2019, at such time we will send you an individual notification if you are ultimately not selected.

If you are not selected and you have received notification from us of your complete application, you will be invited to participate in the expanded rollout approximately 6 months following the initial rollout. We thank you for your continued interest.

• June 7, 2019: Federal Register Notice published
• July 17 – July 31, 2019: Initial enrollment period and 50 percent cost collection
• August 2019: Industry Day including high-level draft technical requirements
• April 2020: User agreement and eSignature requirements posted
• May 2020: Selected permitted entities receive agreement package to submit to SSA
• June 2020: Implementation for selected permitted entities
• September 2020: Notification of expanded rollout
• October – December 2020: Expanded rollout implementation

The annual number of transactions refers to the number of requests for verification that a permitted entity plans to send to SSA annually.

SSA is unable to provide you with any information regarding the IRS TIN Matching program. We can tell you that SSA is the authoritative source for the Social Security Number (SSN). eCBSV will provide SSN verifications to enrolled permitted entities. An SSN verification is verification that a name, SSN, and date of birth combination matches (or does not match) our records.

Since we have not yet built the verification system, we cannot provide service level details at this time.  However, we anticipate providing eCBSV with the same availability or better of the existing CBSV application, which is as follows:

1. SSA’s verification of an SSN does not authenticate the identity of the individual or conclusively prove that the individual submitting the information is who he or she claims to be. SSA’s positive response on the name, date of birth, and SSN of an SSN verification only establishes that the submitted information matches the information contained in SSA’s records. The CBSV User Agreement specifically states:

   SSA’s verification of an SSN does not provide proof or confirmation of identity….CBSV does not verify employment eligibility, nor does it interface with the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) verification system, and it will not satisfy DHS’s I-9 requirements.

SSA cannot speak to CBSV user recipients’ experience in “confirming good identities.” SSA does not collect feedback from CBSV user recipients about their success or fallout from verifying SSNs through CBSV.