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Recommendation: Try a PASS for Spouse

Your spouse has work related expenses and/or employability investments that are not included in a Plan for Achieving Self Support (PASS) , but could be included if they can help your spouse move toward a goal (which SSA calls an "occupational goal") that will make your spouse more financially self-supporting.

At least some of those expenses and/or investments may be recovered (by increasing your SSI check) if you include them in a PASS. See what happens if you include as much as you can of your spouse's work expenses and/or employability investments in a PASS.

NOTE: Your spouse’s PASS amount can not be greater than the income that the two of you have available. Your available income does not include your SSI Cash Benefit, but does include earnings, other unearned income, and in-kind support (if that support is figured using the Presumed Maximum Value (PMV) rule). It does not include income already designated as an IRWE used to raise your benefit amount.

NOTE: You may not be able to include in your spouse’s PASS disability-related work expenses that are already included in an IRWE. See the additional note at the end of this topic for a fuller explanation. If you do include those expenses in the PASS, you must first remove them from your spouse’s IRWE. Work Expenses can not be included in both a PASS and an IRWE.

ALSO NOTE: Your spouse's PASS must end when your spouse's occupational goal is achieved.

"WHAT-IF?" STEPS

1.        Create a New Situation.

2.        If you have only entered one situation, the new situation will be based on it. Otherwise, choose the column containing the recommendation as the column on which to base the new situation. (The new column will contain the same answers as the chosen column until you make changes.)

3.        Go to the top of the new column and enter a situation label such as "Using PASS for Spouse".

4.        Scroll down to the question in the Work Incentives section, "PASS for spouse reducing Countable Income: Is your spouse claiming any employability investments and/or work expenses under a Plan for Achieving Self Support (PASS)?" Answer, "Yes".

5.        Then accept the suggested amount already shown as the answer for the next question "How much of these employability investments and work expenses per month is your spouse claiming under a PASS?"

REMEMBER: If you are including any of your spouse's work expenses in a IRWE, you should not include those expenses in your spouse's PASS.

6.        Finally, review the numeric and graph outputs for changes to your net income and benefits, and the text outputs for additional recommendations specific to your actual situation.

ADDITIONAL NOTE: Under current PASS rules, only those expenses related to the PASS that weren't pre-existing can normally be considered a PASS expense. For example, if your spouse were already working and paying for medication in order to work, the cost of the medication could be treated as an IRWE. Now, if your spouse intends to work additional hours as the result of a PASS, but no additional medication expense was involved, the original medication could not normally be included as a PASS expense. If there was an expense because additional medication would be needed in order to work the additional hours, only the cost of additional medication could be included under the PASS. In this example, your spouse could have a PASS and IRWE simultaneously. Check with your SSA Claims Representative about whether a specific work expense should be included in a PASS or an IRWE.

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