Updated July 28, 2026. Quick answer: It survives only for people who attained age 62 in a calendar year before 2016. The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 extended deemed filing to full retirement age and beyond for everyone else. Because the grandfathered group has now passed 70, the strategy has no practical remaining use — yet it is still described in circulation as though it were available.
What changed in 2015
Before the change, deemed filing applied only before full retirement age, so someone at full retirement age could file a restricted application for a spousal benefit alone and let their own retirement benefit accrue delayed credits to 70. The 2015 Act extended deemed filing past full retirement age, which removed the gap the strategy lived in.
| Attained age 62 | Restricted application available? |
|---|---|
| Before 2016 | Grandfathered — but this cohort is now past 70 |
| 2016 or later | No |
Treat any current advice recommending a restricted application as out of date. It was excellent advice once. The window has closed by the passage of time as much as by the statute — the youngest grandfathered claimants have aged past the point where delayed credits still accrue.
What is still available
Two things, and they are frequently confused with what was lost. Survivor benefits were never subject to deemed filing, so switching between a survivor benefit and your own remains available to everyone. And voluntary suspension between full retirement age and 70 still earns delayed credits — but it now stops payments to anyone claiming on your record, which removes the point of the old file-and-suspend manoeuvre.
No dollar amounts appear on this page, deliberately. The earnings-test exempt amounts are wage-indexed under 42 U.S.C. §403(f)(8)(B), the benefit formula bend points reset every year under §415(i), and full retirement age is a schedule that varies by birth year under §416(l). Any figure printed in an article is wrong within a year. Take current figures from the Social Security Administration directly, and take your own numbers from your Social Security statement.
Sources
42 U.S.C. §402(w) (delayed retirement credits); §402(b) and (c) (spousal); §402(e) and (f) (survivor); §402(k)(3) and §402(r) (deemed filing, as amended by the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, Pub. L. 114-74 §831); §403(b) and (f) (the retirement earnings test); §416(l) (full retirement age). 20 C.F.R. part 404 as in force July 2026.
This states what the cited authority says. It is not tax advice, and retirement-plan design turns on facts about your business and your other entities that no page can see. Every dollar limit referenced here is indexed and changes annually.