I received a letter for my sons and myself for a phone interview to apply for SSDI and child in care benefits. The paper said I only needed any banking information. I was surprised when we did the entire CDR I filled out a year ago, over the phone. My son has many specialists, meds, etc. and with recently transitioning from Children’s Hospital Specialists to adult care, I was totally thrown off guard struggling to name them all, with meds and addresses. It doesn’t help I had brain surgery a year ago and it affected my memory significantly. He said they will do another medical decision and let us know in 2-3 months but it could be as short as 2-3 weeks. I know there was a lot of info I forgot to include. Is this normal for the application when switching to SSDI when a parent retires? I wish I would of known and could of been more prepared. Doing the 10 page CDR over the phone was definitely not what I expected since he isn’t due for one for 2 years. Should I be concerned that their was a lot of info not included. It was an 1 and a 1/2 hour phone call and he kept saying that’s good enough. He also was asking about our assets which I thought were no longer an issue if he begins receiving SSDI. Thank you so much.

Hi. I can't say for sure, but it doesn't sound like your son is applying for Social Security disability (SSDI) benefits. SSDI benefits are based on a person's own earnings history. Instead, it sounds like your child is probably applying for disabled adult child's (DAC) benefits, also called childhood disability benefits (CDB), that are paid based on a parent's earnings.

If your child has been receiving some other type of disability benefit from Social Security, such as Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or SSDI since before he turned age 22, then Social Security normally could adopt the medical determination from that claim to approve a claim for CDB benefits. But, if the established disability onset date for the other benefit was after age 22 or if your child has done any significant work the other benefit was approved then a new medical determination could be required.

There is no asset limit for either SSDI or CDB benefits, but if your son is currently receiving SSI then it's reasonable to assume that the interviewer may have asked about your son's assets. In any case, if you don't think that you furnished all of the pertinent information about your son's disabling impairment or sources of his medical records dating back to before he turned age 22, then you should recontact the representative who took your claim to add any additional information that you feel is important.

Best, Jerry