How secure is your retirement? Viewers share concerns after 5 on Your Side investigation into State Retirement System errors
For decades, the Retirement Systems Division overpaid retirees.
The unnoticed error added up to $6 million in debt for former public employees, who told WRAL they had no idea their payout was wrong.
On Monday, WRAL News told you the story of Glenn family. Despite letters telling them their payout was accurate, the state contacted the Joseph Glenn in 2018 to let him and his wife, Penny, know they’d been overpaid for 17 years and were on the hook for $241,000.
"I say 'he never going to live to pay that back.' They said 'We’ll we will take it as long as we can,'" Penny Glenn said.
It has many people in the viewing area asking, "How did this error happen?"
The short answer is: It happened because of the way the system is set up, and the Glenns are not the only family this happened to.
5 on Your Side received emails from multiple viewers after Joseph and Penny Glenn's story was published on Monday, many of whom raised concerns about the error that allowed overpayments in retirement payouts.
“The NC State Retirement System needs to be more accountable," said one email.
“My husband had a similar situation with the state," said another email.
One viewer emailed in and said they were "not proud to be a resident of North Carolina.”
With $114 billion and 1 million people to manage, Treasurer Dale Folwell admits mistakes happen.
"When you’re dealing with 1 million people on the pension plan these things do pop up from time to time," Folwell explained. "Nearly one out of ten North Carolinians are connected to the North Carolina total Retirement System in some way shape or form."
If a mistake is made by the state, however, the financial responsibility still falls on the retirees and not the state.
Treasurer Folwell cites a statute from 2003, which states an "overpayment shall be recouped by all lawful means."
If you think these repayments would end over time, you'd be wrong.
Lawmakers passed legislation in 2017 that expressly disallows any time limits on how long the Retirement Division can take to look for its past errors to seek recoupment of any overpayments it finds, even if overpayments are unknown to the retiree and is caused by the state's own errors.
In short, once the state finds an error, even if it happened decades ago, they will go after the overpayment, no matter how large or how small, and regardless of how many years have passed.
Folwell recently announced his support of a bill that he says would provide more leniency in recouping money owed to the Retirement Systems Division. It would allow the state to negotiate with retirees on the terms of the repayment. It passed the House and is currently in the state Senate.
As for Penny Glenn, a GoFundMe has been set up for her. Joseph Glenn passed away after paying just over $4,000 of the money he owed. As of Thursday evening, the GoFundMe has raised over $6,000.
Penny Glenn told WRAL News she is overwhelmed by the support and wants to make sure other families don't have to go through this.
If you have gone through a similar situation as the Joseph and Penny Glenn, contact 5 on Your Side at this submission form or email us at karthur@wral.com.
