Most people approved for FERS disability retirement assume the paperwork is finally over. It is not quite. If you are under age 60, the Office of Personnel Management has an ongoing interest in one number: what you earned last year.
Why OPM asks
FERS disability retirement is not a permanent, unconditional benefit for annuitants under 60. It rests on the premise that your medical condition prevents you from rendering useful and efficient service in the position you held. If your earnings later demonstrate that your capacity to work has substantially returned, the law treats that as a change in circumstances.
The mechanism OPM uses to check is an annual request for earned income information. It is routine, it is not an accusation, and receiving one does not mean anyone suspects you of anything.
What the request actually asks
The request focuses on earned income for the prior calendar year — generally wages from employment and net earnings from self-employment. Include income earned during the year even if receipt was deferred; exclude income earned before the effective retirement date.
It is not asking about your entire financial life. Ordinary investment income, retirement annuity payments, and VA benefits generally are excluded. Rents or royalties received through a trade or business can count. Many annuitants over-report because they assume every dollar counts, and that mistake can cause an unnecessary review of a benefit that was never actually at risk.
For 2025 earnings reported in 2026, OPM required most annuitants to use Retirement Services Online, with exceptions for specified payee or guardian arrangements. The published submission window ended June 30, 2026. Do not treat that expired date as a future deadline: follow the notice for your own reporting year or contact OPM if a report remains outstanding.
What happens if you do not respond
This is the part people underestimate. Failing to return the requested information can result in your annuity payments being suspended. Not reduced, not flagged for follow-up — suspended.
The frustrating part is that this outcome usually has nothing to do with the underlying facts. Annuitants lose payments because a form went to an old address, or arrived during a hospitalization, or was set aside during a difficult month and forgotten. The benefit was never in jeopardy on the merits. The silence created the problem.
Practical steps that prevent problems
- Keep your address current with OPM. Also keep your Services Online contact details current. OPM cannot reach you at an address you left three years ago, and it is your responsibility to keep it updated.
- Respond even when the answer is zero. If you had no earned income, say so. A returned form showing zero closes the loop cleanly. An unreturned form does not.
- Keep your own records. Retain a copy of what you reported and the year it covered. If a question arises later, contemporaneous records answer it in minutes rather than months.
- Understand the categories before you fill it in. Knowing what counts as earned income — and what does not — prevents both over-reporting and under-reporting.
The larger point
Annuitants get into difficulty with the earnings rules far more often through inattention than through anything deliberate. The rules themselves are knowable. The reporting is manageable. What causes real damage is treating approval as the end of the process rather than the beginning of a different one.
If you are planning to return to work in any form — employment, consulting, or a business of your own — understanding how earnings are counted before you start is considerably easier than untangling a problem afterward.
The Federal Disability Review provides education and planning consultations for disability annuitants navigating the earnings rules. Eligibility and earning capacity determinations are made solely by OPM.
Keep reading
- What Counts as “Earned Income” Under the 80% Rule
- Restored to Earning Capacity: What Happens Next
- Medical Recovery vs. Earning Capacity
See current TFDR services for available educational support.