Help! Any women living in EC that are on Social Sec Survior Benefits??

I'm very worried about this as I am a widow on Social Security Survivor Benefits from my late Husband's Social Security, I was planning on moving to Ecuador within a year and just found this information from the Social Security website, I am a US citizen, now a very worried one! Are there any other widows down there that are living on SSSB?? Am I missing or not understanding something? Hope someone knows about my situation!
http://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10137.pdf

"If you are a citizen of one of the countries Listed below, {Ecuador is on this list} you also may get payments as long as you are outside the United States
unless you are receiving your payments as a dependent or survivor. In those
cases, we require you meet additional requirements. See pages 10 and 11 for more.

{pages 10 and 11}
Additional residency requirements for dependents and survivors If you receive benefits as a
dependent or survivor of a worker, special requirements may affect
your right to get Social Security payments while you are outside the United States.
The residency requirement does not apply if you meet any of the following conditions:

You were initially eligible
for monthly benefits before
January 1, 1985;

Your entitlement is based on the
record of a worker who died during
U.S. military service or as a result
of a service-connected disease
or injury;

You are a citizen of a country
page 5 lists; {Which Ecuador IS NOT on that List}
or

You are a resident of a country that
has a social security agreement
with the United States. Page
8 lists these countries."
{Ecuador is NOT on that list either!!}

I do not fall into any of those categories!

SuePearson wrote:

I am a US citizen.....

"If you are a citizen of one of the countries Listed below, {Ecuador is on this list}


YOU are a US citizen - born in the US and/or have a US passport

You are NOT an Ecuadoran citizen. You were not born in Ecuador and do no carry an Ecuador passport.

Residency does not equal citizenship.

Therefor none of it applies to you.

Thank you for your reply! So I must be misunderstanding what a Cedula is! I thought that was like a citizenship, but it must be just a permanent visa or something then?  I have never heard anyone say much about it. I'll be checking that out better... I am so relieved! Thank you

I think a credula can best be understood as a national ID card. One does not have to be a citizen of Ecuador in order to qualify for the credula.

I think you have a lot of confusion with the terminology and concepts of,

visas
residency
citizenship

I can only suggest that you research these terms so that you have them all straightened out in your head so that you can proceed with less confusion.

Yes, I think I have it now, I was afraid that getting a Cedula (before full retirement age) was like citizenship, glad that's straightened out!


gardener1 wrote:
SuePearson wrote:

I am a US citizen.....

"If you are a citizen of one of the countries Listed below, {Ecuador is on this list}


YOU are a US citizen - born in the US and/or have a US passport

You are NOT an Ecuadoran citizen. You were not born in Ecuador and do no carry an Ecuador passport.

Residency does not equal citizenship.

Therefor none of it applies to you.

And of course you can be a citizen of both countries…….