Why would i get a letter from the bureau of fiscal service

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Table of Contents Show

Agency Details
Main Address:
Phone Number:
Government branch:
Parent Agency
What is the function of the Bureau of the Fiscal Service?
What is debt management services?
What is G invoicing?

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The Bureau of the Fiscal Service manages all federal payments and collections, and provides government-wide accounting and reporting services. You can contact them to buy bonds or to check on the maturity of bonds you own.

Agency Details

Website:

Bureau of the Fiscal Service

Buy and Redeem U.S. Government Securities

Contact:

Contact the Bureau of the Fiscal Service

Main Address:

Liberty Center Building
401 14th St., SW
Washington, DC 20227

Phone Number:

1-202-874-6950

Forms:

Bureau of the Fiscal Service Forms

Government branch:

Executive Department Sub-Office/Agency/Bureau

Parent Agency

U.S. Department of the Treasury

A few days ago, a reader of this column contacted me with a concern: She received an official-looking letter that made her pause. Was this a scam?

The letter, dated July 19, 2016, came from the Department of the Treasury, Bureau of the Fiscal Service in Washington. The envelope had a return-address label, a sticker, with an Alabama post-office box. The envelope was stamped with 46 cents postage.

This letter came from the U.S. Treasury on official-looking stationery. But the reader was not familiar with the Bureau of the Fiscal Service. When I looked it up, I found that the Bureau was set up in 2012 as a merger of the Bureau of the Public Debt (BPD) and the Financial Management Service (FMS). The BPD financed the government. FMS collected money for the government. Now those two functions are combined. The Fiscal Service also runs TreasuryDirect, the online site where investors can buy Treasury bills, bonds and notes.

The letter relayed five messages:

1. '(W) e are responsible for disbursing your Social Security payments to you.''

2. There was a ''potential disclosure'' of personal data: ''Due to a programming error, we sent a letter with your name and information to an incorrect mailing address. The letter ... contained ... your name, Social Security number, and information about your Social Security payment.''

3. You need to take action: ''We strongly recommend that you monitor your credit report and financial transactions. If you find suspicious activity on your credit report or have reason to believe your information is being misused, you should take the action that is further detailed in the letter, such as filing a police report.''

4. Free credit monitoring was offered in the letter, but you had to activate monitoring within 90 days of the date of the letter.

5. A phone number was provided to call with questions.

What do you do if you get a letter like this? If the letter is a scam, calling the phone number will connect you to the scammer.

Fraud comes in many forms, and letters that warn of potential identity theft are common, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

We all know that government impostor scams are not new, as the FTC warns on a regular basis. For example, the FTC recently issued an alert to consumers that victims of fraud are being targeted by scammers pretending to be from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. According to an FTC alert, the ''scammers may copy the SEC seal or forge signatures of SEC officials, to try to make their messages look official. They may even link to the SEC's website or make messages appear to come from SEC email accounts.''

Official-looking letters from scammers posing as the IRS can tell you that you need to contact them because of a problem that needs to be corrected. For example, they might say that more than one tax return was filed with your Social Security number, you owe more tax, or you received wages from an employer you do not recognize, according to USA.gov, a division of the U.S. General Services Administration's Technology Transformation Service.

In this particular case, however, my sources at the Bureau of the Fiscal Service confirmed that the July 19 letter was indeed legitimate. The letter was sent to about 2,000 Social Security recipients.

The phone number in the letter also is legitimate 800-304-3107, and the Bureau encourages you to call if you have any questions or need further information. Follow the instructions in the letter so that your identity is not compromised. The Bureau's spokesperson emphasized that the Bureau is committed to safeguarding and protecting personal information.

If you get a letter that looks legit but may not be, caution is in order. Don't follow the instructions before you check out the source. The best way to do that is to look up the phone number for the agency in question and call it directly. You'll find out if the agency did indeed send the letter, and you'll be able to confirm your next course of action.

For a list of scam alerts issued by the FTC, go to https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/scam-alerts.

For more information about impostor scams, go to https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/sec-imposters-dont-be-twice-fooled. For information on tax-related frauds, see https://www.usa.gov/common-scams-frauds.

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Julie Jason, a personal money manager (Jackson, Grant of Stamford, Conn.) and award-winning author, welcomes your questions/ comments (). To hear Julie speak, visit www.juliejason.com/events.

What is the function of the Bureau of the Fiscal Service?

At the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, we collect revenue, delinquent debt, and disburse funds to millions of Americans ensuring their timely receipt of benefit payments. Our easy-to-set-up direct deposit programs streamline the government benefit payment process.

What is debt management services?

Debt Management Services (DMS) helps federal agencies and state governments collect debt (the money owed to them).

What is G invoicing?

G-Invoicing is the long-term solution for Federal Program Agencies (FPAs) to manage their intragovernmental (IGT) Buy/Sell transactions. G‑Invoicing helps (or will help) agencies and their trading partners: Negotiate and accept General Terms and Conditions (GT&C) agreements. Broker orders.