Medicare recipients who reside in New York should keep an eye out for their new Medicare card.

In an effort to prevent fraud, and fight identity theft, the federal government is issuing new Medicare cards to all Medicare beneficiaries that will no longer have Social Security numbers on them. The federal government began mailing the new Medicare cards to more than 59 million Americans in April 2018, and New York beneficiaries of Medicare should be receiving their new cards this month according to Medicare.gov.

The process should be completed by April 2019.

In the meantime, if you are a Medicare beneficiary, then you should keep track of when your new card will arrive and contact Medicare if you don’t receive it.

Now that Medicare has begun mailing cards to New Yorkers, it can take up to a month to receive the card. If you did not receive a card by the time the government is finished mailing the cards to New Yorkers, then you should contact Medicare at 1-800-MEDICARE (633-4227), or 1-877-486-2048 for TTY users, as soon as possible.

If your mailing address is not up to date, call 800-772-1213, visit www.ssa.gov, or go to a local Social Security office to update it.

You should continue to use the old card until you have the new card. If you have a Medicare Advantage plan, the Medicare Advantage Plan ID card is your main card. It is recommended that you keep your new card accessible since your doctor may want to see your new Medicare card as well.

BEWARE – Phone scammers are using the introduction of the new cards as an opportunity to separate Medicare beneficiaries from their money. The cards are free and you don’t need to do anything to receive your card. So, if you receive a call requiring payment before the card can be issued to you hang up the phone and then report the scam to Medicare.

To check the status of card mailing and for more information please visit https://www.medicare.gov/newcard/.

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