Maybe true for all of them, as offices are closed Wed pm in my neck of the woods as well.
All of the feds’ infrastructure is ancient, including the IRS and Air Traffic Control. That’s on Congress who sets/approves IT budgets. SS & Medicare do yeoman’s work given the complexity of the rules/regs and with what little support they have.
btw: just be aware that anything told to you verbally, can always be changed by a Super. In other words, just because they tell you ‘a,b,c’ on the phone does not mean it is correct and teh SS cannot be held to what they tell you verbally.
Ask for everything in writing.
My only SS issue had nothing to do with Medicare. I earned more than the amount allowed at age 65. So…they asked me to pay back what they had paid me in SS benefits…all $2020 of it (that’s for the whole year…). It was a cluster…K from the start. First they said to mail a check. Then I got another nasty letter from them saying I hadn’t paid…6 months later. Turns out they take up to 9 months to process a check. I stopped payment on the check (which BTW, SS claims they never received) and paid by credit card. Immediately processed! And I got a nice letter from SS saying I was paid in full. But wait…a few months later, I got another letter saying I still owed them the $2020. Stupid people. I called and the rep on the phone said that was an error and they had in fact received my CC payment (which I had the receipt for…and their letter). Got another letter saying I was paid in full.
But here is the best part. After all that paying…I got a letter saying I actually didn’t owe them the money (yes I did) and they had deposited it back into my account. Really? So I called again, and they referred my issue to their internal auditors who said I would get an answer “soon”. That was at least three years ago.
I’m not calling them again about this.
But Medicare? No issue with that…at all.
My DH dealt with SS at age 65…still working so took part A only. He has excellent feedback about our local office where he got an in person appointment quickly.