Disability Tax Credit Stories: Debra Gold
Deb says: Knowledge is Power
This post was written by our ambassador, Debra Gold. She details her experience with the Disability Tax Credit as a client of another service provider, who will remain unnamed per Debra’s discretion.
So, I received a call from a friend wanting to talk to me about a Disability Tax Credit….
“But I’m not disabled!” I responded.
She says, “You have diabetes, don’t you?”
I pause.
She continued, “Well, the government considers that a disability.”
She encouraged me to look into it, as I may be entitled to it. I decided to take her advice and logged onto the government website which listed the eligible disabilities -and diabetes was among them.
I decided to work with a company that assisted people with the paperwork and provided guidance in order to apply for the tax credit. Even though I was told by a few people I could do this all myself and not have to pay them a fee, I felt I wanted to use them just in case something tricky came up that I wouldn’t know how to address.
They were great. I filled out my portion and the rest was filled out by my doctor. The company told me what criteria I had to meet and after discussing it with my doctor, she filled out her portion.
I also had to give written approval to CRA to allow the company I was working with permission to access the past 10 years of my tax returns to confirm I was in fact eligible, which was fine with me, since it’s a tax credit. I had to prove I indeed paid taxes for those 10 years. They assured me that the information was not kept by them once they reviewed it. It was simply to show them that I did pay taxes for the past 10 years, which made me eligible to apply for the refund. So, I was fine with giving them my permission.
After all of the documents were completed and ready to be mailed to CRA, the company found an error by the doctor. Thank goodness, they found it before I submitted the paperwork to CRA! So, once the doctor made the correction, it was off to the mailbox – time to wait and see if I would be approved.
Week one….nothing
Week two…..nothing…….three, four, five…….SOMETHING!
To my delight, my application was approved and two weeks later the funds were deposited directly into my bank account. I was thrilled!
So, my husband and I purchased that big mansion we’ve always wanted….. (Kidding of course).
What the money did do was allow us to do some of the things to our home that we’ve wanted to do, but had been doing slowly as we’re retired, so now we could speed that up!
As if that wasn’t great enough, I’m able to use the deduction every year on my tax return, which also gave me a sizable refund this year. Don’t get me wrong, the money didn’t change our lives, but it was substantial enough to be added to our retirement nest egg, which is always a great thing. But getting this refund could certainly change people’s lives that are struggling to pay for some health care services that may not be covered, like certain medications or equipment.
It was a straightforward process for me, and a pleasant experience with the folks I worked with that yielded me money I was entitled to.
How bad can that be, right?
Debra worked as a Sales Executive in the tech industry for 16 years and 10 years as the V. P. of Purchasing in the computer industry. She’s travelled the world and spent 5 years living in the Middle East. Today she’s enjoying life day-by-day.
We’re always looking for people to share their experiences with the disability tax credit. Oftentimes there are great stories of how easy it was to get a refund. The other times, it’s not. Every Disability Tax Credit situation is unique and we want to showcase them all.
If you’d like to contribute to Disability Tax Credit Stories, please email communications@thenba.ca!