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If you think you are eligible for Social Security benefits, you have every right to file a claim for those benefits. This is a message I've delivered before in this column. But recent emails tell me it's time to send the message again. Here are several of those emails.

Q: Even though my husband and I lived together for 20 years, we didn't actually get married until two years ago. Sadly, he died last month. When I contacted Social Security to file for widow's benefits, the clerk told me we had to be married at least 10 years, so she said I wasn't due anything. Is there anything else I can do?

Q: I am 62 years old. I called Social Security's 800 number and told them I wanted to file for my Social Security benefits. I run my own business, but plan to turn it over to my wife and pay myself a small salary to stay under the earnings penalty limit of $23,000. The telephone rep I talked to told me I was not eligible for benefits and terminated the interview. Do I have any recourse?

Q: I am 60 years old. I've had to stop working because of bad knees and high blood pressure. I called Social Security to inquire about filing for disability benefits. The agent told me my condition wasn't severe enough to qualify. But I know other people with problems similar to my own, and they are getting disability. What can I do?

Before I get into the specifics of each of these questions, I'm going to repeat my overall message. Whenever you think you might be due any kind of Social Security benefit, insist on filing a claim for that benefit. Even if the Social Security Administration rep you are talking to discourages you from filing a claim, remember you have every right to do so.

For part of my 32-year career with the Social Security Administration, I was a claims intake person. In other words, it was my job to help people file claims for various kinds of Social Security benefits. Most times, a person's potential eligibility for benefits was fairly cut and dried. For example, if you were 62 years old and not working and you showed up at my desk to file for retirement benefits, I would have immediately whipped out the retirement application and helped you fill it out.

But other times, a person's eligibility for benefits was questionable. And I might have been inclined to suggest the person just forget it and go home. But I never did that. I always helped him or her file a claim. Why? For three reasons.

Reason number one: It was drilled into me from the start of my career that people always had the legal right to file for any kind of Social Security benefit.

Reason number two: It was my job to protect the client's legal rights. Here's an example of what I mean by that. If Mary wanted to file a claim for spousal benefits, and I misread the law and told her she wasn't eligible, she had no legal recourse. On the other hand, if she had filed an actual claim, and that claim was mistakenly denied, she would have had the right to appeal that decision. I can't overemphasize how important those legal rights are.

And the third reason I would always help someone file a questionable claim was more self-serving. I knew that Social Security office staffing was doled out based on the number of claims the office took. In other words, the more claims I took, the better chance there was that our office would get the extra staff we always felt we needed. So, I always thought that taking claims was a win-win for both the client and my local SSA office. But I've been retired for 20 years now, and I wonder if things are different at the SSA today. (Maybe office staffing is doled out by the young whippersnappers who run the Department of Government Efficiency and not by any rational method?)

Anyway, now I will address the questions from the three people whose emails I included at the start of this column.

Unless I am missing some of the facts, the widow who was married for a couple of years before her husband died was given bum advice by the Social Security rep to whom she talked. The 10-year duration of marriage rule applies only to divorced spouses. So, assuming this woman was still married to her husband when he died, and is old enough for widow's benefits, and assuming she is not getting higher benefits on her own Social Security account, she should be getting widow's benefits and should file a claim immediately.

The guy with the business is treading a fine Social Security eligibility line. In the past, the rules were pretty stringent. He would not have been able to simply turn the business over to his wife on paper and pay himself a minimal salary and then expect to collect Social Security retirement benefits. But the SSA has eased up on these rules, and he may be eligible. Again, the only way he will find out for sure is to file a claim.

And the woman who wanted to file for disability benefits should insist on doing so. Even though she claims to just have "bad knees and high blood pressure," you never really know. Maybe a medical exam by a Social Security contract doctor conducted as part of the claims process will reveal that she actually has some severe heart issues.

So again, the overall message to everyone reading this column is this: Always demand to file a claim for benefits if you think you might possibly be due them -- no matter what a Social Security rep tells you.

And finally, I just thought of this. I'm always preaching to file your Social Security claim online at www.socialsecurity.gov. If you do it that way, the computer, unlike a possibly unhelpful SSA agent, won't try to stop you.

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If you have a Social Security question, Tom Margenau has two books with all the answers. One is called "Social Security -- Simple and Smart: 10 Easy-to-Understand Fact Sheets That Will Answer All Your Questions About Social Security." The other is "Social Security: 100 Myths and 100 Facts." You can find the books at Amazon.com or other book outlets. Or you can send him an email at thomas.margenau@comcast.net. To find out more about Tom Margenau and to read past columns and see features from other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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