Medicare surcharge appeals · 2026
Retired recently? Your Medicare surcharge may be appealable.
Medicare prices your premium off the tax return you filed two years ago — so a surcharge set by the income you earned while still working can follow you into retirement. When a life-changing event has cut your income since then, that determination can be appealed. Start by seeing what you are actually being charged.
- Verified against the CMS notice
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What are you being charged?
Ten seconds. No signup to see your number.
Adjusted gross income plus any tax-exempt interest — the figure Medicare used.
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It is a cliff, not a ramp.
Every other bracket in the tax code phases in. IRMAA does not. One dollar over a threshold and you owe the whole step — for twelve months, and for each spouse.
A couple at $218,000 pays nothing. At $218,001 they pay $2,296.80
Nothing on your return warns you. The determination letter arrives about eighteen months later.
The full 2026 table
Every bracket, both filing statuses, straight from the CMS annual notice.
| Single MAGI | Married filing jointly | Part B premiumper person / month | Part D surchargeper person / month | Extra per yeara couple, both enrolled |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $109,000 or less | $218,000 or less | $202.90 | — | — |
| $109,001 – $137,000 | $218,001 – $274,000 | $284.10 | $14.50 | $2,297 |
| $137,001 – $171,000 | $274,001 – $342,000 | $405.80 | $37.50 | $5,770 |
| $171,001 – $205,000 | $342,001 – $410,000 | $527.50 | $60.40 | $9,240 |
| $205,001 – $499,999 | $410,001 – $749,999 | $649.20 | $83.30 | $12,710 |
| $500,000 or more | $750,000 or more | $689.90 | $91.00 | $13,872 |
Standard Part B premium $202.90/month; annual deductible $283. Figures are the 2026 amounts published by CMS and verified 2026-08-05 against the annual premium notice. MAGI here means AGI + tax-exempt interest.
A table can’t tell you what to do next.
Your current bracket was fixed by a return you already filed. The question with money in it is the forward one — and three things make it harder than it looks.
Today’s income sets 2028
A conversion or capital gain now shows up as a Medicare premium two Januaries later. Single-year planning cannot see it.
The problem grows
Required distributions rise every year and push MAGI up with them. Doing nothing is itself a decision.
Brackets halve, RMDs don’t
When one spouse dies the other files single — roughly half the thresholds, on much the same distributions. Usually the largest driver of lifetime tax.
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Zachary Wolfson
Founder, Wolfson Private Wealth
Wolfson Private Wealth is an independent, fee-only fiduciary firm in Fort Lauderdale. The firm sells no products and earns no commission on anything — which matters most in exactly the situations where a lot of poorly aligned advice tends to arrive.
Zach Wolfson owns and operates other businesses outside this firm, including insurance agencies that earn commissions on health and Medicare insurance. Wolfson Private Wealth sells no insurance, earns no commission on anything, and is paid only the advisory fee its clients pay it. The firm does not recommend that its clients buy insurance through those agencies, and any policy a client buys anywhere is outside this engagement and is never billed under it. These outside businesses take time and attention, which is a conflict worth knowing about. They are disclosed in Item 4 of Zach’s Form ADV Part 2B and Item 10 of Part 2A, which you can read at adviserinfo.sec.gov under CRD 314416.
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Questions people actually ask
What year’s income determines my 2026 IRMAA?
Your 2024 return. Medicare works on a two-year lookback, so income earned this year sets your premium two Januaries from now. That is why a single-year calculation is misleading.
Does municipal bond interest count?
Yes, in full. MAGI for IRMAA is adjusted gross income plus tax-exempt interest — so the strategy that lowers your income tax does nothing for your Medicare premium.
Can I appeal it?
Yes, after a qualifying life-changing event — retirement, death of a spouse, divorce, loss of a pension or of income-producing property. File Form SSA-44. Note what is not on that list: a Roth conversion or a capital gain. Those are voluntary — which is why conversion timing has to be planned against the lookback in advance.
What happens when one spouse dies?
The survivor files single, and those thresholds are roughly half the joint ones. An income that sat comfortably under the joint threshold can land two or three brackets up — while the required distributions continue at close to their old size.
Do these brackets change every year?
Yes. The first four thresholds are inflation-indexed and re-published each autumn. The top threshold was fixed by statute and does not move on the same schedule, so any multi-year IRMAA forecast is an assumption about future indexing, not a fact.
How this bracket check works, and what it cannot do
Criteria and methodology
- The table is the published 2026 IRMAA schedule, reproduced from the CMS annual premium notice. It is a statement of fact, not a projection.
- The bracket check compares the MAGI you enter against those thresholds, reports the tier it falls in, multiplies the surcharge by twelve months and by the number of people you say are enrolled, and measures the distance to the next threshold.
Assumptions and limitations
- The figure you enter is your modified adjusted gross income — adjusted gross income plus tax-exempt interest — from the return two years before the premium year. Entering this year’s income instead will give you the wrong bracket.
- It assumes the enrolment count you select and that both parties are enrolled in both Part B and Part D. It does not know about employer coverage, Medicare Advantage arrangements, or a pending appeal.
- It reflects the current year only. It makes no forecast of future thresholds, which are re-indexed annually.
- It cannot tell you whether a determination is correct or appealable. Only the Social Security Administration can, via Form SSA-44.
Investments considered
- This page considers no investments. It compares an income figure against a published government premium schedule, and neither recommends nor selects any security, fund or product.
Applies to every result this tool produces
- Results are hypothetical in nature. They are produced by a model, not by any account, and no client obtained them.
- Results vary with each use and over time — with the figures you enter, with the assumptions above, and with changes in tax and Medicare law, which change annually.
- This tool does not consider your full circumstances and is not investment, tax, or legal advice. Using it does not create an advisory relationship.