Human Resource Blog

Is it legal for a TPA to ask the employer for a copy of the employees SS card?

I discovered on an audit that one of our TPA’s has a couple of my employees SS wrong. When I informed them of the mistake they requested copies of the employees SS cards, to make the change. Is it legal for a TPA to ask the employer for a copy of the employees SS card?

We assume by TPA you mean Third Party Administrator. The TPA can legally ask for anything, including a million dollars and an all-expenses paid vacation in Cancun. Whether or not you should comply, is a different issue.

In several states including Texas, it would be illegal for you to share the employees social security number with anyone outside the company, period. It is not a best practice in HR to use the social security number to identify employee records. A number of states prohibit this, and even prohibit the social security number from appearing on the paycheck. Obviously, using the social security number raises enormous concerns about identity theft. You should not present a copy of the employees social security card to the TPA.

It sounds like the TPA is merely using the social security number as a way to identify employees — as a kind of ID number. If this is true, it really does not matter whether the social security number is accurate or not. As the employer, you need an accurate social security number for tax reasons, and to verify an employees legal right to work in the US. However, the TPA probably does not need an accurate social security number.

If you feel that this situation could present a problem for the employees in the future, then you should have the employee contact the TPA directly. The employee can then decide whether to supply a social security number to the TPA or not. But if the TPA has not had access to social security cards from all employees in the past, we see no reason why they need any employees ss card now.

You may also want to consider switching to a TPA that does not use social security numbers as employee IDs.