I'm sending in the first CSL disability application.

My health issues are ADHD (combined), PTSD with Depression, Fibromyalgia, Epstein Barr Virus (mono), and two sleep disorders (both of which cause inattention and daytime sleepiness). I also have two separate physical injury conditions (the first injury caused the Fibro).

I'll let you know how it goes. (I expect to be denied and denied, until I get serious with a Lawyer's Letter, accompanying the Application.)

Are you sending this via a collection agency, or direct to Canada Revenue Agency?  If the former, remember to put 'Without Prejudice' at the top to keep them from using the information to put more pressure on you to make minimum payments.  If the latter, you're more likely to get a response, in my experience.

The collection agency that sent in my first application never sent on my followup information that was requested, so I ended up getting the loan bounced back to collection with a 'client did not respond' note on it.  Then, after I phoned them and bugged them to go look at the mail they had recorded as 'received' from me, they admitted it hadn't been sent on and indicated they'd do it right away.  But it didn't change their collection efforts and I never heard from the government either. 

After chasing fruitlessly around the government directories for a good while (while fielding repeated collections calls from the agency) and not finding the right department to contact directly, I finally got a notice from the tax dept about garnishing my cpp overpayment.  I instantly wrote them back saying, in effect, 'I have been trying to get this loan or some portion of it forgiven for two years now because I am disabled, but the collections agency (named) has not forwarded the information I gave them.  Please help.'

They immediately sent me back a collections package with a Canada Revenue Agency return address.  By this time my medical form was out of date so I had to pay to get another form filled out.  However, I figured it was a small price to at least finally be sure the right people were looking at this. 

Included in my NEW package of information in support of my disability were:  copies of old and new medical forms to demonstrate the disability is a long-lasting one, copies of Health Canada information demonstrating that people with my disability are almost always permanently and significantly limited in their income-producing ability, copies of letters I had sent to the collections agent that were never forwarded but contained relevant background information, and the tax-returns and financial forms they asked for. 

Within a month they got back to me to ask for one followup piece of information, which I sent, and now the loan is in review-pending status at CRA.  No more calls from the collections agent, no more nasty messages on the answering machine, no more panic attacks every time the phone rings.  It has been a very restful 5 months.  I don't expect to hear anything now until September, when the government workers are all back from break, but even if they turn me down flat, I'm now a couple of years closer to the 10-year date (it will be within months, instead of years, from then).

Good luck with your application.  If you have to reapply, try to give as much calm supporting evidence as you can, including all relevant medical information and even more than they ask for.  They're accountants, after all, not medical personnel or social workers with understanding of disabilities.  You can't count on them looking up one single thing about your medical situation. 

Canada Student Loan (CSL) Disability claims do not go to CCRA (Revenue Canada) or a Collection Agency.

The Form for applying is put out by HRDC/Service Canada.

One friend who eyeballed the "CSL Disability Application Form" says the package looks almost exactly like the "CPP Disability Application Form".  

NB. (I am on my 1st Interest Relief application.)

I do not think CSL Disability applications can be made to HRDC is a person has gone into re-payment or defaulted. (Correct me if i'm wrong!) I cannot afford to wait until re-payment/default to apply. Governments move so slowly...

from my personal hell oops i mean experience or lack thereof,

if your loan is in default you can beg all you want to, they will "consider" your request but 99.999999999999 % of the time you will get rejected.

and if your disability does not occur within six months of graduation (ie when you are still on that lovely interest free no paperwork to be lost ride) chances are you'll get rejected yet again, no matter how poor your health.

if they decide to consider your app there is a screening process where you meet appointed health care reps who screen you to see if you really are totally incapable of ever ever working again ( no small hurdle to jump).

good luck in your quest...

Ah, the dreaded IMEs. (Independent Medical Examiners.)

NB. No, i'm not in default of any loans. (Thank goodness!) Still in *Interest Relief Land* <TM>.

I am thinking of hiring a Fibromyalgia/CFS lawyer here in Toronto. Or at least go in for a legal opinion.

My medical forms keep saying that (a) i have not improved enough with the Tx i have rec'd and that (b) there is no more treatment available for someone this symptomatic, and (c) one treatment program that exists has at 5-7 year waiting list.

my situation went.  they lost my forms, i was in default, too late to resend them since there's a time limit from when they sent me the forms...yadda yadda yadda.  still can't work more than an hour a day.  still can't sleep worth a darn.  still have no appetite, still have fibro, still have carpal tunnel, still have chronic fatigue, still have bipolar disorder, still suffering from depression though the medication helps according to my husband my mood swings and my manic episodes are under control .  i'm still obsessive compulsive, too, with nasty mood swings and anger management problems - just the qualities any potential employer is looking for !!  oh yeah and now that i can't work but don't qualify for disability so i have no money to pay my loans back - my blood pressure is hovering near the we need to medicate you level. 

end rant.

the cold weather is coming - i'm soooo looking forward to barely being able to get out of bed cause it feels like an elephant is laying ontop of me.  oh yeah and i get that SAD thing happening all winter as well.  ho ho ho.

how are things going on your end emma ??  gotta be better than mine.

updating my earlier post from July:

Forms can and do go to CRA.  Presumably, if the loan is old enough, and far enough in arrears that they're claiming against your income tax returns, it's considered a debt owing to the government, and not a 'Student Loan' any longer.

In early September I got a letter from CRA saying they could not forgive my loan but, based on my well-documented disability, it would be placed on non-collection status indefinitely, in case I ever do earn enough to start paying it.

For those people who think you have to be totally disabled and on a ventilator to qualify, I can testify that's not necessary just to get them to stop collection efforts.  I was quite honest with them that I was working 10 hours/week doing bookkeeping at home, and had two doctors notes (five years apart) stating that that's the most I could reasonably be expected to work until some effective treatment is available for my condition.

Thank heavens THAT stressor is off my back, as I am now in a wheelchair, needing oxygen, and unable to work even those 10 hours.  I'd probably kill myself if I still had to field calls from those vultures at the collection agencies while all this new health stress is going on.

Still, assuming I make it through this winter, I'll be within spitting distance of the 10-year mark, and I'll be filing to have the debt included in my old bankruptcy.  Only if THAT is also successful will I truly feel free of this looming mountain of debt.

Ah, i see what you mean, Hairtearer.

That situation does not apply to me (yet), as i am not in default (yet). I am one month into my second period of Interest Relief.