Double Orphan Pension (DOP) reassessments and reviews 007-06030000

If the agency becomes aware of a change in circumstance or an anticipated event that may affect a customer's DOP eligibility, it should be investigated immediately. For example, a parent of a refugee child has arrived in Australia, or a parent has been released from prison or discharged from a psychiatric institution.

If there is a known or anticipated event, in Customer First, create a manual review on the Review Registration (RVR) screen and complete the fields as follows:

• Service Reason: DOP
• Review Reason: DOP (Double Orphan Pension)
• Due Date: date of anticipated event
• Source: INT
• Date of Receipt: today's date
• Notes: 'DOP review Type: CoC. DOP CIRCS: (include details of known or anticipated event e.g. parent of refugee child has arrived in AU or parent has been released from prison/psychiatric institution).'
• Keywords: @DOP
• Workgroup: leave blank
• Position: leave blank
• Transfer to Region: leave blank

The review will mature on the Due Date coded in the RVR activity. Workload Management will allocate the review for manual action.

See local Processing Services details for: Double Orphan Pension (DOP).

A DOP customer's obligation is to notify of changes within 14 days. Each of these changes will result in cancellation of DOP:

• the surviving parent is released from remand/prison, or a sentence is delivered of less than 10 years
• the surviving parent is released from the psychiatric institution/nursing home
• for refugee children, if one or both of the parents enters Australia
• the surviving parent's whereabouts become known to the child or customer, or they become aware of who the surviving parent is
• a child aged 16-19 ceases to meet FTB study requirements (for example, child leaves care or level of care reduces to less than 35%)

For Double Orphan Pension (DOP) and Bereavement Smart Centre Processing staff only.

DOP periodic reviews are required in the following circumstances:

• DOP customer/child known or anticipated events
• the expected date of a surviving parent's prison release
• a surviving parent is held in remand and has been charged, but not convicted, of an offence which is punishable for more than 10 years and is in custody still awaiting sentencing (review once sentencing has been handed down)
• overseas absences
• residency
• death of a DOP child
• change in care circumstances
• child precluding payments
• nursing home/psychiatric discharge
• child turning 16 (check entitlement to Youth Allowance, see Independence for Youth Allowance (YA) customers)
• DOP child leaving care
• adoption
• decrease in legislative rate of Family Tax Benefit (FTB) Part A

As well as periodic reviews, DOP eligibility is manually reviewed every two years that the customer receives a DOP payment for a DOP child.

For Double Orphan Pension (DOP) and Bereavement Smart Centre Processing staff only.

A review is created on the DOP customer's record with a due date in the future.

There may be a need to confirm the information provided, for example, by obtaining further evidence which may result in the customer's record being investigated and reviewed.

Issue a review letter to the DOP customer to respond, see the Resources page for example wording. Allow 22 days (14 days + 8 days to allow extra time for mail delivery) or 29 days for remote areas and overseas.

Did the customer respond to the review letter?

• Yes and:
• the review can be completed, go to Step 7
• the QSS32 response has been received for surviving parent whereabouts unknown (PWU), and more information about the customer’s knowledge of the parent’s whereabouts is needed to determine continuing eligibility for DOP, go to Step 5
• No, cancel DOP from date paid to (DPT) + 1 and manually issue a DOP cancellation letter to the customer outlining the reasons for cancellation of their claim. Procedure ends here

Service Officers:

• must make genuine attempts to contact the customer by phone to obtain details of:
• last contact
• approximate whereabouts, if known
• likelihood of future involvement, and
• what attempts the customer has made to establish the surviving parent’s whereabouts
• may identify a customer or double orphan child are experiencing vulnerability or risk. In these cases, Service Officers must make appropriate external and/or internal service referrals. This may include offering a social work referral if the vulnerable circumstances are complex, and the customer does not have adequate support
• should consult with a social worker if they need assistance to determine continuing DOP eligibility, due to sensitive circumstances. For example, if the phone interaction has become difficult for the customer due to complex grief. The social worker will determine whether they can provide advice to the Service Officer based on existing information. They will also determine if it is more appropriate to take over the call with the customer or making a subsequent outbound call to the customer

Is a referral to a social worker needed?

• Yes:
• if the Service Officer has completed the consultation with a social worker go to Step 7
• if the social work referral is for support only, complete a referral to social work indicating the support required, then go to Step 7
• the social worker will attempt to contact the customer, go to Step 6
• No, go to Step 7

The Service Officer should place the review activity on hold for 7 days.

The social worker will attempt to contact the customer and:

• will create a DOC on the customer’s record with details of:
• last contact with the child’s parent
• approximate whereabouts, if known
• likelihood of future involvement, and
• what attempts the customer has made to establish the surviving parent’s whereabouts
• will record any sensitive personal information in the Social Work Information System (SWIS)
• if unable to contact the customer, they will create a DOC with details of the unsuccessful genuine attempts to contact

When the review matures, the Service Officer should complete the review of the customer’s entitlement, go to Step 7.

Complete the review of the customer’s continued entitlement to DOP: For help, see Eligibility and coding for claims for Double Orphan Pension (DOP)

• DOP may be cancelled upon completion of the review
• Make genuine attempts to contact the customer to inform them of the outcome
• Use the Generic Letter guided procedure in Customer First to generate and issue a manual DOP Cancellation letter (Q999) to the customer

FTB/DOP customers are no longer required to provide education details for a child in their care turning 16 years of age in order to retain FTB/DOP eligibility.

An automatic letter is generated and issued to the FTB/DOP customer, including Approved Care Organisations, outlining the FTB/DOP child's expected study completion date. See Family Tax Benefit (FTB) for children aged 16-19 years.

Customers will only need to advise the agency if the FTB/DOP child study details are not correct or if their circumstances have changed.

For some DOP customers the Child Education Details Workflow will need to be run to update the child's details, e.g. course end date (if the child is subject to study requirements) and manual processing is required where a child is DOP only child.

If the DOP customer receives the DOP Additional Component, manually action the review.

If the customer does not receive the DOP Additional Component, the system automatically applies the Consumer Price Index (CPI) adjustments to the customer's record.

• DOP CPI - 1 January each year
• FTB CPI - 1 July each year

For Double Orphan Pension (DOP) and Bereavement Smart Centre Processing staff only.

If a DOP customer receives the DOP Additional Component, DOP reviews need to be manually actioned.

For DOP manual rate cases, a Manual Follow-up (MFU) is created on the customer's record to prompt the DOP and Bereavement Processing Smart Centre staff to manually update the rate.

If a DOP Smart Centre officer cannot complete existing activities before a CPI automated assessment, further action is required to update the customer's manual rate.

DOP and Bereavement Processing Smart Centre staff must refresh the customer's record:

• select the MFU activity on the Activity List (AL) screen
• go to the Benefit Action (BA) screen
• in the Service Reason field, key 'DOP'
• in the Action field, key 'REA'
• in the CPI date, key the date of effect

Update the manual rate on the Manual Rate (MAR) screen and complete the activity as per normal processing.