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Fix missing income requirement in Senior Citizen Tax Freeze screening

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Assessment

Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Newbie friendliness
48/100
Issue type
Bug
Clarity
Clearly specified
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
java
Domain
backend

Research direction

Start by comparing library-api/src/main/resources/benefits/pa/phl/senior-citizen-tax-freeze.dmn with checks/income/tax-freeze-income.dmn and the PhlLowIncomeTaxFreeze composition; confirm the income definition and existing test locations. Then update the SCTF composition, metadata, documentation, and fixtures as described. Done means the boundary, missing-evidence, and existing age-path scenarios pass, along with library compilation and discovery/schema/composition checks.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

Problem

library-api/src/main/resources/benefits/pa/phl/senior-citizen-tax-freeze.dmn currently composes enrollment, owner occupancy, Philadelphia residence and age checks, but does not check income. Its local tSituation also omits applicantAndSpouseIncome.

Consequently, an otherwise qualifying applicant can receive isEligible: true even when their income is unknown or exceeds the program limit. The DMN documentation currently identifies this as partial screening.

Philadelphia requires both age and income eligibility. The official Senior Citizen Tax Freeze guidance lists inclusive total-income limits of $33,500 for a single person and $41,500 for a married couple (source checked 2026-10-17).

Reuse the existing income check

checks/income/tax-freeze-income.dmn already exposes TaxFreezeIncomeService, and PhlLowIncomeTaxFreeze already composes it. It uses the canonical applicantAndSpouseIncome field, primaryPersonId and spouse relationships, with inclusive single/married thresholds and unknown results for missing income or relationship evidence.

  • Import and invoke TaxFreezeIncomeService as a named entry in SCTF's checks context, following the Low-Income Tax Freeze composition pattern. Do not introduce a duplicate income fact, algorithm or threshold table.
  • Add applicantAndSpouseIncome to SCTF's minimal local tSituation; reuse its existing person/relationship fields. Confirm the current program income definition matches the shared check before composing it.
  • Add the corresponding knowledge requirement and KIE Tools 10.2 DMNDI shape/edge. Preserve the existing age pathways and the standard all(checksAsList) aggregation.
  • Confirm generated OpenAPI input and x-bdt-benefit composition metadata include the income requirement so newly imported builder benefits collect and evaluate it.
  • Replace the partial-screening descriptions/annotation with accurate documentation after the rule is implemented, and update the shared income check's description that currently says SCTF does not invoke it.

Acceptance criteria and validation

  • With other requirements passing, single income at $33,500 passes and income above it fails; married income at $41,500 passes and income above it fails.
  • Missing income or unresolved spouse/marital evidence produces an unknown income result and isEligible: null when all other requirements pass. An explicitly empty relationships list establishes the existing single-person route.
  • A known failed requirement still yields isEligible: false even if income is unknown.
  • Existing applicant, spouse and late-spouse age-path fixtures are updated with appropriate income evidence; adding income does not change the age algorithms.
  • Existing Low-Income Tax Freeze and reusable TaxFreezeIncome scenarios continue to pass without duplicated rules.
  • Bruno benefit tests cover the inclusive boundaries, over-limit and missing-income cases; library compilation/tests and discovery/schema/composition checks pass.

This fixes an existing omission identified during the library documentation migration. Related: #563 (expose DMN documentation and limitations in the builder).

Dominant language
Java
Stars
16
Forks
5
Avg merge
15h 42m
Merged PRs (30d)
21

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