Doing this for someone
You are doing this for someone else.
A great many of these applications are filled in by somebody other than the person they are about. Every other page here says “you”. This one does not.
This page is for you if
- You are a parent applying for your child.
- You are an adult child helping a parent who is finding the paperwork impossible.
- You are a spouse, a sibling, a friend, or a support worker.
- You have power of attorney, or you are simply the person who is going to do it.
What only they can do — and what you can
Form T2201 has two parts. Part A is theirs: it asks who they are, and who should receive the credit if they do not owe enough tax to use it. Part B is the doctor’s. Nothing stops you sitting beside them and filling Part A in together — but it is their application, in their name, about their body.
The credit can come to you
If the person you are helping does not owe enough tax to use the credit, it can be transferred to a supporting family member — somebody they depend on for food, shelter or clothing. That can be a spouse or partner, a parent, grandparent, child, grandchild, brother, sister, aunt, uncle, niece or nephew, and the same relations of their spouse.
The catch is on the form. You have to be named on the application, at Part A question 2. If you are not, the transfer is not automatic — you have to write to the CRA separately afterwards and ask for it, signed, explaining the support you provide.
If it is your child
Once your child is approved for the Disability Tax Credit and you already receive the Canada Child Benefit, the Child Disability Benefit is added automatically. There is nothing else to apply for. The CRA will also work it out for the current benefit year and the two before it, on its own. For any year further back, you have to send a written request to your tax centre — that part is not automatic, and nobody tells you.
Approval also lets you open a Registered Disability Savings Plan in their name, which you can hold while they are a minor.
Speaking to the CRA for them
The CRA will not discuss somebody else’s file with you unless they have authorized it. That authorization is its own step, and doing it early saves a phone call you cannot finish. Ask them to add you as a representative before you need to chase anything.
One thing worth saying out loud
The medical part of this form asks what a person cannot do, on their worst ordinary day, in detail. Not everybody wants the person who loves them reading that, and not everybody wants to say it in front of them. The sheet for the appointment can be printed and filled in by them alone, and handed straight to the doctor. Offer that. It costs you nothing and it may matter more than the paperwork.
Where to start
The check works the same way whether you are answering for yourself or for somebody else — answer as the person you are helping, on an ordinary day, counted with whatever medication and equipment they use.