D. What About Social Security Administration Benefits and Child Support?

While kinship families serve as foster parents, they receive a monthly foster care payment from DFPS. If the child in the kinship family's care receives Social Security Administration (SSA) benefits also or if child support monies have been court ordered, DFPS receives and uses these funds to offset the cost of the child's foster care payments. The kinship family will receive the foster care payments in lieu of the child's SSA benefits or child support they may have previously received from DFPS. When the court gives legal custody (PMC) to the kinship family and PCA benefits begin, the kinship family must apply with the SSA to become the representative payee of the child's SSA benefits and arrangements must also be made for the kinship family to receive any child support payments that have been court ordered.