How to Become an Inland Regional Center Vendor for Social Recreation (Service Code 525)

This is the plain-English guide we wish existed. It walks you through IRC vendorization for DDS service code 525, Social Recreation. That's the code most dance studios, music teachers and activity programs look at first. It's updated for 2026 and the DDS Provider Directory.

A quick refresher if this is all new. Inland Regional Center serves people with developmental disabilities in Riverside and San Bernardino counties. It can pay approved providers, called vendors, for social recreation. The approval process is vendorization. Your vendor application is the paperwork you send to get approved.

Not sure 525 is your code? Art programs and camps often fit other codes. Check other service codes for dance, art, music and camps first.

The five steps and their timelines

1. Choose your code. For most recreation and activity programs that's 525. Art programs may fit 094 and camps may fit 850. Some studios don't need to vendor at all under code 459.
2. Request. In the DDS Provider Directory you create a profile and request the requirements for your code. The regional center has 15 days to respond.
3. Program design. Inland Regional Center requires a full program design for 525 — a written description of how your program runs. IRC lists 45 days for its first review, 30 days for each later review, and 30 days for you to resubmit.
4. Application. You upload your application and documents in the Directory. The regional center has 30 days to check that it's complete.
5. Approval and rate. The regional center has 45 days to decide. If approved, you get a vendor number. For 525, DDS no longer issues a separate rate letter, and form DS 1897 is no longer required.

These are the regional center's deadlines, in calendar days. Your own prep time comes on top.

Documents checklist

For social recreation and camps, DDS created a short Standardized Vendorization Packet listing five documents.

• DS 1890 — Vendor Application
• DS 1891 — Applicant/Vendor Disclosure Statement
• W-9 — Request for Taxpayer Identification Number and Certification
• HCBS Provider Agreement — the Home and Community-Based Services provider agreement
• HIPAA / BAA — the Business Associate Agreement

DS 1890 and DS 1891 generate inside the Provider Directory once you complete your profile, so those two aren't forms you hunt down.

On top of that, have your business license and proof of liability insurance ready. Your business license must show an address in Riverside or San Bernardino County, because Inland Regional Center can only approve providers inside its service area.

After approval, contact Inland Regional Center to set up eBilling — that's how invoices get submitted and paid. It's a separate step once you have your vendor number.

What the program design actually is

This is the piece that stops people, and it's most of what you're paying us for if you take the Done-With-You option.

A program design is a written handbook describing how your program runs for the people Inland Regional Center serves. It covers your business and your service, who you serve and what you can accommodate, what actually happens in a session, who your staff are and what qualifies them, your health and safety procedures, how you'll track progress against a participant's goals, and your rates.

Most small studios have never written any of this down. That's normal, and it's not a disqualifier. The program design is where those procedures get written down for the first time.

We confirmed directly with Inland Regional Center's Resource Development and Transportation Unit that service code 525 requires a full program design. If you want to confirm it yourself, call (909) 890-3000, press 0 and ask for the RDTU Duty Officer, or email resource@inlandrc.org. It's free, and it's a good call to make.