Medicare’s IRMAA appeal form is SSA-44, “Medicare Income-Related Monthly Adjustment Amount — Life-Changing Event,” and it goes to the Social Security Administration — not to Medicare — because Social Security is the agency that sets the surcharge. Filing is free, the form runs a few pages, and it applies when a qualifying life-changing event, most often retirement, has reduced your income below the amount on the tax return that produced your surcharge.
Revised: 7/24/26
Jason Baar
Fee-Only Medicare Advisor
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It walks through Form SSA-44 step by step — the eight qualifying life events, the evidence that supports each one, and a worked example.
The guide is on its way — allow up to 10 minutes. If it hasn’t arrived by then, peek in your spam folder, and if it’s there, click “Not spam,” so the next person’s guide arrives where it belongs. You’re all set.
The long answer
The form exists because of a lookback rule: Social Security calculates IRMAA from IRS data that is two years old, so your 2026 Part B and Part D surcharges were set by your 2024 return. When life changed in between — a retirement, the loss of a spouse, a divorce — the form substitutes a documented estimate of your income as it is now.
It asks for one qualifying event and its date, your estimated MAGI for this year — adjusted gross income plus tax-exempt interest — and for next year if it will fall further, and your evidence. One detail married couples miss: the surcharge is charged per person, so if both spouses are on Medicare, each files their own SSA-44 with the same event and numbers.
Download the current version free at ssa.gov/forms, pick one up at any Social Security office, or handle the whole thing by phone appointment at 1-800-772-1213. And if your issue is simply that the tax data was wrong or outdated, skip the form — ask Social Security to redo the determination using the corrected return or IRS transcript.
Printed from JasonKnowsMedicare.com — “The Medicare IRMAA Appeal Form: A Plain Guide to SSA-44”. The free IRMAA Appeal Kit is available at tally.so/r/XxvNNO · Questions: (850) 810-1000
This page is educational information, not personal financial, tax, or legal advice. For decisions about your own situation, talk with a qualified professional.