Someone's calling about your Medicare

A stethoscope held in a hand — Photo: Shixart1985 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0

Medicare fraud costs the government an estimated $60 billion a year, according to the Department of Health and Human Services — and a share of that comes directly from beneficiaries who were talked into giving up their Medicare number over the phone.

What it sounds like

"This is calling from Medicare. We're issuing new Medicare cards this year and yours is about to expire. I just need to confirm your Medicare number and date of birth to send your new card."

Or during open enrollment each fall:

"You qualify for a free genetic testing kit, a back brace, or a new benefit — I just need your Medicare number to process it."

What they want: your Medicare number. It works like a Social Security number for your medical identity — whoever has it can bill Medicare for equipment or tests you never received, in your name.

The truth: Medicare does not call, text, or email you. It communicates by mail. It never asks you to confirm your Medicare number, Social Security number, or bank details over the phone — it already has them.

What to do: hang up. If you think there's a real reason Medicare needs to reach you, call 1-800-MEDICARE (1-800-633-4227) yourself, the number printed on your card.

About the real new cards

Medicare has been mailing some beneficiaries new cards with new ID numbers this year, after a data exposure. This is real. It is also exactly the kind of real event scammers use as cover — a caller claiming to be "processing your new card" and asking you to confirm your number is impersonating a legitimate mailing to get the one piece of information Medicare would never ask for by phone.

If your card is genuinely being replaced, it will arrive by mail, with no call, no confirmation, and nothing for you to do.

The other version: open enrollment

Each fall, scammers pose as Medicare agents offering a "better plan" and ask for your Medicare number to "switch you over." A real agent from a plan you contacted can help you compare options — but an unsolicited call offering a better deal, asking for your number to lock it in, is the scam.

What to do: compare plans yourself at medicare.gov or call 1-800-MEDICARE. Or call your State Health Insurance Assistance Program (SHIP) — free, unbiased, no sales involved. Find yours at shiphelp.org.

If you already gave your number

Call the Medicare fraud hotline (part of the HHS Office of Inspector General) at 1-800-447-8477 and ask for a review of your account. You can also watch your Medicare Summary Notice — the statement Medicare mails after each claim — for services you don't recognize.

Nobody legitimate calling about Medicare will ever ask you to confirm your number to them. The number is already theirs. Anyone asking for it is telling you, in that one sentence, that they aren't who they say.