Just received an autism diagnosis? Start here, one step at a time.
You do not need to understand the law. You need paperwork, receipt numbers and persistence — and that is done one step at a time, in the right order. This is the roadmap for families in Brazil’s Federal District, from what can be done in a week to what you prepare for age 18.
This text is for anyone who has just received a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder and is staring at a mountain of acronyms — BPC, CIPTEA, CadÚnico, AEE, ABA — with no idea where to grab hold. The short answer is: grab one end only. There is an order, and it saves months.
Three truths to start with a lighter load.
1. None of these rights expires. There is no deadline you have missed. Start today, in March or next year — everything still stands. You are not late.
2. The hardest part is behind you. The diagnosis exists and it is on paper. That was what held everything up. The rest is queues, forms and stamps: tiring, but it is no longer discovery, it is just the road.
3. Only two things run on a clock. The BPC (a monthly benefit for people with disabilities on low income) is paid from the day you apply, not from the day it is granted — applying early is worth money. And school enrolment follows the calendar of the Secretaria de Educação (the Education Department). Everything else can wait at no cost.
One remark before the steps, because it spares you frustration: the "level" on the diagnostic report is not the passport it appears to be. Support levels 1, 2 and 3 come from the DSM-5, a clinical manual — and no Brazilian law grants a benefit by level. What the INSS (the social security agency), the school and the health plan assess is function: what the child can and cannot do alone, and what barriers that creates. A report that says only "F84.0, level 2" is a weak report. That is why step 1 is what it is.
This week: gather the paperwork
None of these steps costs money and three of them can be done on your phone. They exist so that, next month, you do not hear "a document is missing" at any counter.
Ask the doctor for a fuller report
This is the step that decides all the others. The INSS, the health plan and the school do not read the diagnosis: they read the description of daily life. A report that carries only the disease code is the most common reason an application is denied.
“Doctor, I am going to file applications with the INSS and with the school. Could you write a report that states: that the impairment is long-term, with effects lasting more than two years; what he cannot do alone in hygiene, eating and communication; what barriers this creates at school; and how many hours a week of each therapy he needs — without limiting the number of sessions?”
If the doctor resists: explain that this is not a whim of yours, it is what the forms require. Reports from the speech therapist, the occupational therapist and the psychologist count as additional evidence.
Get his CPF and his Cartão do SUS
A child needs their own CPF (taxpayer ID number) to enter the Cadastro Único and the INSS, and the Cartão SUS (public health system card) to move along the queue in the public network. Many people find out it is missing right at the moment of the appointment.
Where: CPF on the Receita Federal (federal revenue service) website or at a notary office; Cartão SUS at the UBS (the local public clinic) nearest your home or through the Meu SUS Digital app. Take the birth certificate and your own photo ID. It is issued on the spot.
Issue the autism ID card — the CIPTEA
It is the card the Federal District Government recognises at the counter, created by Lei Distrital 6.642/2020. It is valid for five years, it is free and it guarantees priority service in any queue. More importantly: it is what later waives the diagnostic report when you apply for the parking permit.
Where: on the website of the Secretaria da Pessoa com Deficiência (the Department for People with Disabilities), sepd.df.gov.br, under Cadastro da Pessoa com Deficiência. The printed copy, with lanyard, is requested afterwards at the Central office in the 112 Sul Metro Station.
While you are at it: ask for the sunflower lanyard too (Lei 14.624/2023), the national symbol for disabilities that cannot be seen from the outside. At the airport, the bank and the supermarket queue, it saves you from explaining everything all over again each time.
Book the Cadastro Único at the CRAS
Book it today, even if the appointment is only three weeks away — the queue at the CRAS (the local social assistance centre) is what delays everything else. The Cadastro Único (CadÚnico, the federal registry for social programmes) is not a benefit: it is the key to four of them (the BPC, the electricity bill discount, the low-cost INSS contribution and the Federal District Government’s home-ownership programme).
Where: the CRAS in your administrative region, through sedes.df.gov.br.
This month: file the applications
Here the steps run at the same time. Do not wait for the INSS to answer before approaching the school, nor for the health plan before going to the CRAS. Each one moves at its own pace, at different counters.
Complete the Cadastro Único on the appointed day
One hour of service that unlocks months of benefits. The detail most often lost is a single field: the child must be registered as a person with a disability. That field is what makes the electricity bill drop on its own, without you asking for anything.
Take: ID for every person living in the household, proof of address, the diagnostic report and proof of income for whoever works.
“I would like to register in the Cadastro Único. I have a son with a disability and I am going to apply for the BPC. Please record his disability in the registration and give me the receipt with the Folha Resumo.”
Do not leave without the Folha Resumo. It is the summary sheet the INSS will ask for, and going back to the CRAS just to fetch it costs another whole morning.
Apply for the BPC through the Meu INSS app
It is one minimum monthly wage — R$ 1.621,00 in 2026 — paid for as long as the requirements are met. There is an income condition, and it is the only hard question in this roadmap.
The sum: add up everything that comes into the household each month and divide by the number of people living there. If it comes to R$ 405,25 per person or less (a quarter of the minimum wage), the application stands a good chance. If it comes to a little more, apply anyway: article 20-B of Lei 8.742/93 requires that what the disability costs every month be taken into account.
Where: the Meu INSS app or by phone on 135, under "Benefício Assistencial à Pessoa com Deficiência". You do not need to go to a branch, you do not need a lawyer, you do not need to pay anyone. Attach the diagnostic report, other reports, prescriptions and receipts for spending on nappies, medication, transport and therapies.
Apply early, even if in doubt. The benefit counts from the date of the application, not from the date it is granted. Each month you wait to file is a month that does not come back.
Open the path to therapy
In money terms, this is the most valuable step of all — intensive private care costs from R$ 5 thousand to R$ 15 thousand a month. And, unlike the BPC, it does not depend on your income.
With private health insurance: the plan cannot limit the number of sessions. Resoluções Normativas 469/2021 and 539/2022 of the ANS (the health-plan regulator) took away the insurer’s power to set a cap, and the STJ (Superior Court of Justice) consolidated that understanding in Tema 1.295, in March 2026. File in writing, with the doctor’s prescription, and keep the receipt number. The deadlines are 10 working days for a speech therapist, psychologist or occupational therapist, and 14 working days for a specialist doctor.
Through the SUS: always start at the UBS for your address — it is the UBS that refers you to the regulation service, which allocates cases to the specialised services: CAPSi, COMPP, CER II in Taguatinga and CEAL-LP.
“I would like to open a case for my son, who is autistic, and be referred to the regulation service. Could you give me the referral number, please?”
If the plan refuses, limits or misses the deadline: call 0800 701 9656 and file a complaint with the ANS. It is free, takes fifteen minutes and resolves most cases without a lawsuit.
Take a written request to the school
A corridor conversation with the coordinators counts for nothing later. What counts is a formally filed document. And the law here is firm: refusing to enrol an autistic child brings a fine on the administrator, and denying an accommodation without just cause is a crime (article 88 of Lei 13.146/2015).
Ask for: a support professional in the classroom for the whole school session; specialised educational support (AEE) in the Sala de Recursos (resource room), outside regular class hours; a class with a reduced number of pupils; and a written individual plan, drawn up with you. In the Federal District’s public schools, classroom support is delivered through the Educador Social Voluntário programme.
A private school cannot charge extra. Not one cent for support or accessibility — a "mediator fee" does not legally exist.
“I have brought a written request, in two copies. Please file it and return one copy to me with the stamp, the number and the date.”
If they refuse or stall: take the case to the Ministério Público do DF (the public prosecutor’s office), through mpdft.mp.br. It is free, needs no lawyer and is usually the fastest route there is for school matters.
Over the next three months: reap and protect yourself
Free pass on public transport — for you as well
Free travel on the Federal District’s public transport. The detail most people miss: when the doctor justifies that he needs a companion, the card comes with 16 fares a day — eight for him and eight for you. Anyone who takes a child to therapy three times a week feels it in their pocket.
Where: the BRB Mobilidade desk at the 112 Sul Metro Station, phone (61) 3120-9500. Take the diagnostic report, RG (ID card) and CPF, proof of address, proof of income and a 3×4 photo. Mind the form: free travel for the companion is only granted if the doctor fills in and justifies that specific field.
Parking permit, from your phone
It seems minor until the day of a meltdown in the car park of a packed shopping centre. Pulling up close to the door changes the whole outing.
Where: the Detran-DF Digital app or the Detran (traffic department) Portal de Serviços. Anyone who already holds the CIPTEA does not need to present a diagnostic report — which is why step 3 comes before this one. The review takes up to two working days and you print it at home, on A4 paper.
Go to the INSS assessment — and tell the whole truth
There are two assessments: one with a medical examiner and one with a social worker. And here is the advice that changes outcomes the most: we tend to show our child’s best day. It is a mother’s pride, it is natural — and it gets the application denied. Describe the ordinary day and the bad day.
Tell them: how many hours a day he needs someone with him; what he does not do alone (bathing, eating, dressing, crossing the street); what the meltdowns are like and what triggers them; who in the family stopped working because of this; how much goes out each month on medication, therapy, nappies and transport. Take the folder full — it weighs in your favour.
If they deny it, do not lose heart: you have 30 days to appeal, free of charge, through Meu INSS itself.
Reduce your working hours, if you are a public servant
A public servant with a child with a disability is entitled to work fewer hours, without losing pay and without having to make them up later. It is not a favour from your manager: it is article 98, §§ 2 and 3, of Lei 8.112/90, and the Supreme Court has ruled in Tema 1.097 that it applies at all three levels — federal, district and municipal. Apply in writing to the human resources department, with the diagnostic report attached.
The R$ 81,05 that protects his future
If you look after the home and have no income of your own, you can enrol with the INSS by paying 5% of the minimum wage — R$ 81,05 a month, under code 1929. It looks like very little and it is, probably, the most important decision on this entire page.
A child with a disability receives a survivor’s pension (pensão por morte) for the rest of their life when an insured father or mother dies — without the cut-off at age 21 that applies to other children. But this only exists if at least one of you is insured with the INSS. The BPC, on its own, leaves nothing to anyone: it ends with the person who receives it. And the two coexist — contributing does not interfere with his BPC.
Keep the reports from now on. That pension requires proving, down the line, that the disability already existed before age 21. Anyone who throws away today’s medical records discovers the problem thirty years from now, when it can no longer be redone.
When you have breath to spare
Sign up for the Federal District Government’s home-ownership programme
The Morar Bem programme, run by Codhab (the district housing company), reserves 8% of its units for people with disabilities and gives 1,500 points in the registry. It requires five years of residence in the Federal District and not owning property here. Registration is free and stays valid — doing it early can only help.
Put together the folder of his life
One physical folder and one on your phone, with everything photographed: dated diagnostic and medical reports, therapists’ reports including the old ones, every receipt number, invoices for therapy, medication, nappies and transport, and the school report cards. It looks like bureaucracy and it is care — it is what spares you from starting from scratch with every application, every change of school, every INSS review.
What is not urgent
Half the despair comes from thinking everything was due yesterday. It was not. These four things come up in every conversation about autism and none of them needs you right now:
- Buying a car with tax exemption. The right exists (IPI, ICMS and IPVA), it is worth having and there is no hurry — it only makes sense when there is money for the purchase. And the rules on value and time limits change, so you check them the week you buy, not before.
- Legal incapacity or guardianship (interdição or curatela). It is only discussed close to age 18 and today it is an exceptional measure. Before it there is supported decision-making (tomada de decisão apoiada), which is far less heavy.
- A will and life insurance. Important, yes — for a year when the dust has settled.
- Hiring a lawyer now. Almost everything here is settled by app, counter and form. A lawyer comes in if there is a lawsuit, and the Defensoria Pública do DF (the Public Defender’s Office) does it for free.
Phone numbers to keep
- INSS — BPC, appeals and the R$ 81,05 payment slip: 135 or the Meu INSS app
- ANS — the plan refused or limited therapy: 0800 701 9656
- BRB Mobilidade — free pass, 112 Sul Station: (61) 3120-9500
- SEPD-DF — CIPTEA and Cadastro da Pessoa com Deficiência: sepd.df.gov.br
- Saúde do DF — UBS, CAPSi, COMPP and the ombudsman: 160 or saude.df.gov.br
- CRAS — Cadastro Único: sedes.df.gov.br
- MPDFT — the school refused enrolment or support: mpdft.mp.br
- Defensoria Pública do DF — free lawyer: defensoria.df.gov.br
If at any point you need the legal basis for each of these steps — the articles, the benefit tables and request templates ready to file —, it is in the companion document: the complete map of the rights of people with ASD in the Federal District →
About this guide. Written on 14 September 2026, with rules and figures checked on that date (2026 minimum wage: R$ 1.621,00). It is preliminary guidance in the public interest: it helps you get started, but it does not replace a lawyer registered with the OAB (the Brazilian Bar) or a medical assessment. Amounts, caps and deadlines change — confirm with the official source before any decision involving money.
