SSI help needed

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
SSI help needed
4
Thu, 03-15-2007 - 10:08am

Hi,
I'm applying for SSI for Billy and they are driving me nuts! The agent needs fifty bazilion documents and when I get them all together she doesn't understand what I gave her and then won't call me back. I finally have to, after leaving 6+ messages, get her supervisor. She called me back within the hour and made it sound like it was my fault she didn't call me back. Anyways, my question is, if I get approved for SSI for Bill, do you have to document each month where you spend the money. Not that I'm going to be blowing it on shoes & make-up!LOL but how much paperwork is involved with this? We are going on 3 months worth of back and forth with them not liking the papework I send. No phone calls back etc. I'm so frustrated I'm ready to tell them to forget it. Basically, I guess my question is how hard is this once you get approved. Will I be sending them paperwork constantly of what we are using the money for? Thanks guys!

Jen

 

Jen

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-25-2003
In reply to: jengerl
Thu, 03-15-2007 - 10:42am

jen,


I wish I had an answer, but I have never applied for SSI.

-Paula

visit my blog at www.onesickmother.com
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
In reply to: jengerl
Thu, 03-15-2007 - 10:48am

I have no idea but I do know the paperwork is a pain in the tush.

I have a friend with 6 children, 2 with special needs (one downs syndrome, one severe BP/everything else). Thier income is within the poverty level for thier family size. They filled out all the paperwork, set up appointments, didn't get calls back and then they didn't qualify for SSI because they owned thier 2 cars which was more than 6K in assests.

After that I never even bothered trying. I thought that problem was more a california thing though.

Renee

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iVillage Member
Registered: 06-02-2004
In reply to: jengerl
Thu, 03-15-2007 - 12:12pm

I'm not sure what state you live in, but I can tell you our experience with SSI disability in Texas. We had it up until about six months ago when my husband graduated from college (finally). We didn't have any trouble qualifying when we applied because we were living mostly on student loans and two part-time jobs. Medically speaking, we didn't have any trouble qualifying because Lily also has other health problems besides ASD due to the rare syndrome that she has. We never had to supply documentation of how we spent the money. About every 6 months or so we had to send in our paystubs and they would decide whether or not we had gone over our monthly income allowed by the federal law. We only went over once due to some overtime that my husband got. I think we only had to pay back $50 or so. Because Lily qualified for SSI disability, she was also given traditional medicaid, which was very helpful for all her extra medical expenses. Once my dh graduated, we were told that we would only qualify when he didn't get any over-time (which he always gets) and that we would have to be on a month by month qualification. That meant we would have to send in our check stubs every month to prove our income and THEN they would decide if she qualified to have any medical expenses reimbursed through Medicaid and we might owe them money from the check they would have already sent us if we didn't qualify. Since we have medical insurance now, we decided it was waaay too much of a hassle to have to prove our income every month just to get Medicaid. SSI disability was a much needed help for us while dh was in school, so if you can get through the initial paper work, it is worth the hassle. I hope this makes sense. If you have any more questions about our experience, I'll try to answer them as best I can. Good luck!

Amy~Natalie & Lily's mom

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
In reply to: jengerl
Thu, 03-15-2007 - 12:53pm

I will also be interested to hear your follow up. I'm in upstate NY, and I've heard getting SSI is very difficult. However, both boys qualified for medicaid and it picks up the balance of copays that our primary medical insurance doesn't. We also are able to get diapers paid for in full after the age of 3 (I have a 3 and 4 year old both in them--i get about 180 diapers, pampers, each month for each boy!)

And, after almost 1.5 years of paperwork, we are going to finally get our swing paid for! It will be a freestanding swing like they have at schools, with all the bells and whistles. It will cost between $1500-2500 that the state will pay for. It required all sorts of documentation by OT, psych and pediatrician.

Anyway, please keep us posted. It's on my list of to do's, but I hear it can take up to 2 years to complete.

Valerie

~Valerie