About Bereavement services 099-01000000

It is the responsibility of the Service Officer to ensure the agency is providing all the products and services appropriate to each customer's needs and to make an appropriate service offer.

Rather than contacting the agency to ask about a particular payment, a customer can describe their circumstances and in return receive a 'service offer' that consists of the most appropriate products and services. The Payment and Service Finder can help the customer identify these, see the Resources page for a link.

This reference material provides the information necessary to understand the agency's approach to customers who need help after someone has died or who are preparing for bereavement.

The agency delivers these products and services on behalf of the Department of Social Services (DSS).

Assistance includes:

• Bereavement payments:
• short term financial assistance to help people adjust to changed financial circumstances following a death
• includes lump sum payments and in some cases, continuation of particular payments for the duration of the bereavement period
• Partner Bereavement Payment - for JobSeeker Payment (JSP) and Youth Allowance (YA) customers
• Exemptions from mutual obligation, activity test or participation requirements during the bereavement period - for JSP, YA, Parenting Payment and Special Benefit customers
• Exemptions from some waiting periods - for JSP and YA claimants
• Continued entitlement to income support payments for the survivor during the bereavement period
• Where a customer is single, payment of pension up until the end of the entitlement period in which the person died

Assistance may also be available to a non-customer following the death of their partner, once the death has been confirmed and an appropriate payment is claimed, for example, JSP, YA or Pension Bonus Bereavement Payment (PBBP).

When a family assistance payment customer dies, the person now caring for the deceased's children may be entitled to any payments the deceased has not been paid and any ongoing payments.

Services include:

• Social Workers
• Financial Information Service (FIS)
• Multilingual Phone Service (MPS)
• Indigenous Service Officers (ISO)