A Social Security payment of up to $4,873 will be sent this week

Some Social Security recipients will receive their October payment this week.

Benefits administered by the Social Security Administration (SSA) are paid monthly. With tens of millions receiving checks each month, payments are spread out across the calendar.

This week, those with birthdays between the 11th and 20th of a given month of the year will receive their payment. This is the penultimate payment this month, with another scheduled for next week on October 23rd.

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Those with birthdays earlier in the month should have been paid out by October 9th. Payments for beneficiaries who have filed claims since May 1997 and those applying for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) stopped earlier this month.

If you haven't received your monthly payment on the expected date, the SSA recommends waiting three business days before contacting the agency. Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays are not considered working days.

The amount of retirement pension you receive depends on several factors, such as the age at which you receive the pension and your income during your highest-paid working years.

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In 2024, the maximum benefit of $4,873 is only available to people who retire at age 70. This amount is also influenced by their income during their most lucrative working years. If you want to stop working and start collecting retirement benefits at the earliest possible age of 62, the maximum pension you could receive is $2,710.

However, all of that may change in the coming months, as beneficiaries learned last week how much their 2025 payments will increase due to the 2.5 percent cost of living adjustment (COLA).

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The 2.5 percent increase means a beneficiary receiving $1,870 a month from the SSA could see their monthly payment increase by about $46.80 next year, according to independent Social Security policy analyst Mary Johnson and Medicare.

“The 2025 COLA will be the lowest that Social Security recipients have received since 2021, while at the same time inflated prices for key essentials such as housing, meat, car insurance, every type of service and repairs continue,” Johnson said in a statement Newsweek.

“Although it is the lowest COLA since 2021, a 2.5 percent COLA would be considered about average.”

The COLA in 2025 was expected to be lower than in previous years as inflation has fallen so far in the year. Inflation fell from 3.7 percent in September last year to 2.3 percent in September this year.

The 2023 COLA was the largest ever introduced. Seniors received an 8.7 percent annual raise after a period of high inflation due to the coronavirus pandemic, which peaked at 9.2 percent in 2022.