Skip to content
Skip to main menu
- What is CalFresh?
- Summary of basic eligibility
- How the CalFresh program is structured
- County and State operational responsibilities
- Using CalFresh EBT benefits
- Who is eligible to receive CalFresh benefits?
- Households receive CalFresh benefits
- People on SSI, CalWORKs, General Assistance or Medi-Cal, or with a prior felony drug conviction
- People who leave the CalWORKs program
- Immigrant eligibility for CalFresh benefits
- Counting “quarters of work” for legal immigrants (if at all)
- Special rules for farm workers
- Special rules for the homeless
- Special rules for students
- Special rules for strikers, roomers, boarders, residents of shelters and drug-treatment locations, and others in unusual situations (Chart)
- Special rules for the “elderly” or “disabled”
- How “elderly” and “disabled” are defined
- People who cannot get CalFresh benefits and how to count their income and resources
- Applying for CalFresh benefits
- Getting and filling out an application form
- Authorized representatives
- People who do not speak English
- CalWORKs diversion payments should not interfere with CalFresh applications
- After the household files its application
- The interview process
- Verifications the CalFresh office requires
- How the CalFresh program verifies information
- Common Verification problems
- Social Security Number requirements
- Finger imaging | Finger printing
- Notification the household either is eligibile or is being denied
- Failure of the CalFresh program to act on an application within 30 days
- What is “income”?
- Definition of “Income”
- Income limits
- 30+ things that are NOT income
- Money that counts even when the household does not get it as income
- How student aid is counted
- How self-employment income is counted and what business expenses can be deducted
- Treatment of income (and resources) of persons excluded from the CalFresh household (Chart)
- Money a boarder pays the household
- Income (and deductions) of ineligible immigrants in mixed households
- Income of an immigrant’s sponsor
- Child support payments made by a household member to someone not in the household
- What are “resources”?
- Definition of “resources”
- How many resources a household can have
- Resource exclusions
- Vehicles don’t count as a “resource” in the CalFresh program
- Selling or giving resources away
- How to calculate the monthly grant amount
- Applicant budgeting rules
- Prospective budgeting for Semi-Annual Reporting (SAR) households
- Budgeting for “change-reporting” households
- Income deductions for CalFresh households
- Medical expense deductions
- First, calculate household income
- Second, use net income to determine the monthly CalFresh allotment
- Example 1 – household with an elderly or disabled member
- Example 2 – household with an unemployed adult
- Example 3 – household with legal immigrants
- Example 4 – household with both documented and undocumented immigrants
- What does the household actually get?
- How much in CalFresh benefits a household gets each month
- How much is the household’s allotment the first month it applies?
- How households get their CalFresh benefits
- Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) system
- Expedited (emergency) Calfresh benefits
- Getting food assistance after a disaster or household misfortune
- Requirements for keeping CalFresh benefits
- CalFresh time limits
- How to keep getting CalFresh benefits (certification periods)
- Failing to fill out or submit the Semi-Annual Report form (SAR 7)
- Coming in for an interview before the certification period is over
- Restoration of “non-assistance” CalFresh benefits after curing the basis for termination
- What happens if the household moves
- Replacing CalFresh benefits if something happens to them
- Non-work program penalties
- What are the CalFresh work requirements?
- Work rules and requirements
- Exemptions from work requirements
- Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents (ABAWADs)
- Waiver of the ABAWD requirements
- Work programs for people subject to ABAWD requirements
- Registering for work
- Non-compliance with a work requirement
- Work supplementation programs
- Underpaid or overpaid benefits
- Underissuances: Getting too few CalFresh benefits
- Overissuances: Getting too many CalFresh benefits
- Overissued … because of an agency (“administrative”) error
- Overissued … because of a mistake the household made (“inadvertent” household errors)
- Overissued … because the County welfare office thinks the household committed fraud
- What is the correct amount of a CalFresh overissuance?
- How the CalFresh program collects overpaid benefits
- The overissuance Demand Letter / Notice of Action
- Fraud Claims
- What counts as an “intentional program violation” (IPV)?
- What is a “disqualification consent agreement” or “waiver” of the IPV hearing?
- The IPV fraud hearing
- What happens if a person loses the fraud hearing, or signs a hearing “waiver” or “disqualification consent agreement”?
- Being taken to court on a fraud claim
- Restoring CalFresh benefits after an IPV
- CalFresh Integrity Plan
- ALERT cases and process
- Work Number verification system
- Notices and fair hearings
- The written notice required when the county plans to stop someone’s benefits
- What to do if the CalFresh office has done something wrong
- Requesting a fair hearing
- What the CalFresh program must do when the household asks for a fair hearing
- Continuing benefits while waiting for a fair hearing
- Specific rights a household has in a fair hearing
- What happens after the household wins the hearing
- What happens after the household loses the hearing
