Keep your personal information safe

Take action now so prying eyes can’t access your account

By Michael Pramik, Ohio Public Employees Retirement System

Aug. 25, 2022 – OPERS encourages our members to safeguard their personal information, especially with open enrollment season upcoming.

Over the phone

As a retiree, you will likely receive phone calls and mail from a variety of vendors offering medical coverage and services during open enrollment. In the past, retirees have reported receiving calls from people claiming to represent OPERS or to be working in conjunction with us. However, OPERS will never call you unsolicited and ask you to provide or confirm personal information, including your Social Security number.

If you call us first and we return your call, we may ask for confirmation of your identity through your OPERS ID or the last four digits of your Social Security number. Your OPERS ID number is exclusive to you and OPERS, and was created to protect your personal information. You can find your OPERS ID on the top-right corner of any recent personalized correspondence from OPERS. If you have any doubt that a caller is a legitimate representative from OPERS, simply hang up and call us directly to confirm. It’s better to be safe than sorry.

Online

OPERS offers all members a secure online account. By registering and signing in to this account, you can access your account details and are able to view and print personalized documents and forms. If you have registered for an online account, safeguard your login information the same as you would an online banking account.

If you have not registered for an OPERS online account, please consider doing so. It’s a simple, secure way to keep your contact information updated and gain access to account information instantly instead of calling us. Also, there’s a trend among hackers to attempt to establish online accounts with financial institutions for people who haven’t yet established an account for themselves. OPERS has safeguards in place to prevent this, but hackers get smarter all the time. If you already have registered for an online account, you won’t become a target for someone trying to gain access to your account information in this way.

If you don’t have an online account, go to our homepage to set it up under “Account Login.” Or, you can call us at 800-222-7377 to set up the account. You’ll need your OPERS ID to register online.