"People want to know how X will affect their benefits/Is it worth the effort to apply for X?"

[bengolder]

A commonly heard issue is that people who are utilizing the safety net cannot effectively plan their lives because they don't know how some particular decision might affect the benefits they depend on.

Eligibility rules are complex, and subtle differences between programs can mean major differences in someones life.

Applying to a program can also be an daunting effort, so a lot of people would love to know upfront if it is worth it to apply.

Common difficulties for eligibility predictions

• Some programs have super complicated criteria for eligibility.
• Some program rules depend on tons of info about the client, such that an accurate prediction of eligibility would depend on collecting almost as much information about the client & household as a complete application.
• Many eligibility determinations ultimately rest on a caseworker's discretionary judgement of verification documents. So even if someone's self-stated income is below a threshold, their docs may be judged insufficient to verify that income level. Where discretion exists, there is often a lot of inconsistency.

Relevant efforts and resources

Eligibility "pre-screeners" are pretty common for services with complex eligibility rules.

• mRelief, early on, developed eligibility estimators that would help people figure out what to apply to.
• GetCalFresh gives an early eligibility guess, partway through their SNAP application.
• for Clear My Record, one of the biggest barriers for people to get their records cleared was knowing if they are eligible. To alleviate this challenge, they developed code that parses RAP sheets in order to find convictions that could be cleared.
• on the Integrated Benefits Initiative, research into the client experience of reporting changes to their benefits exposed this need repeatedly. Providing estimates or predictions was considered but ultimately appeared to difficult. Furthermore, a lot of caseworkers, policy, and operations staff expressed a desire for better standardization of verifications.
• There have been efforts to provide automated verification APIs that might supersede caseworker discretion.
• 18F is exploring better ways to define and maintain eligibility rules
• (there are many more but I'll have to come back to this)

Alternatives to answer the need