Earnings Apportionment Tool (EAT) 107-03020010

EAT is a spreadsheet that determines the amount of one-off (ONE or IOP) employment income to assess for each entitlement period. It uses verified employment income from the employer.

This tool is only for customers whose employment income should be assessed as 'one off in the fortnight':

• pre Working Credit Newstart Allowance (NSA) customers
• all post Working Credit workforce age customers

After entering verified employment income, the tool apportions the employment income over the entitlement periods.

The spreadsheet 'talks' to the customer's Centrelink record. It uploads verified employment income details.

EAT is not a decision making tool. It helps with data entry and processes. Staff must decide if they should apply the earnings assessment and adjustments.

EAT can also determine if there is not going to be a debt. This would mean there is no need to run MultiCal. Common cases would be Youth Allowance (YA) or Austudy students whose employment income reduces their income bank.

The main function of EAT is to fit periods of employment income into the entitlement periods.

If the earnings periods do not fit into 1 entitlement period, EAT will:

• work out the daily average of the employment income
• add the average for each day in the entitlement period

Example

Where a customer is paid for a period greater than their entitlement period, assess the income from their entitlement period start date for the same number of days as their employer pay period. For example, if a customer is paid monthly, assess the income for the same number of days (such as 30 or 31 days).

Note: EAT is only as accurate as the data entered.

The EAN upload and download options work with only 1 employer per EAT.

However, more than 1 EAT may be uploaded into the same activity.

Yes, in the same way as dealing with more than 1 employer (see above).

When uploading for the partner, select the activity for the customer and then switch to the partner record. Key 'SR' in Nxt to switch.

Yes. First select the activity in the Centrelink system. Then run the upload for EAT.

The Centrelink system already has a good Working Credit calculator.

When there is no debt, update earnings on the system to:

• adjust the Working Credit balance
• allow the system to calculate any future adjustments

There may be improvements, but most changes will be to fix problems. EAT is an interim product, pending a fully integrated system.

Payslips sometimes show actual days or dates that the customer worked within the employer pay period. For example, for a weekly pay period from 5 October 2020 to 11 October 2020 with gross income of $485, the payslip may detail that the customer only worked on 7 October 2020 and 10 October 2020, with amounts earned each day.

In this case, itemise each day, instead of using the weekly pay period of 5 October 2020 to 11 October 2020:

• 7 October 2020 to 7 October 2020: $200
• 10 October 2020 to 10 October 2020: $285

For weekly payslips that show days instead of the date, for example Tuesday and Saturday, break these down to daily amounts similar to the example above.

Fortnightly or monthly payslips that show a day without a date cannot be coded in this way. Over a fortnight or month, there is no way to identify which Tuesday or Saturday the customer worked.

Service Officers must decide the best method for assessing each customer's employment income. The same method may not be suitable in every case.

Explain all coding decisions on a DOC.