Immediate payment by payment method direct credit 003-10030010

• Immediate payments cannot be issued if the customer's record is in the 'I' (overseas) environment. For details of other situations in which an immediate payment cannot be issued, see Urgent payments due to exceptional and unforeseen or extraordinary circumstances
• The customer must have already been approved for an immediate payment, such as urgent payment, replacement payment, hardship advance
• The payment is to be made by direct credit to the customer's bank account The Immediate Payment requests script is used to code immediate payments

Before assessing or issuing an immediate payment, make sure the customer record is the correct one by asking authentication questions to verify Proof of Record Ownership (PORO). See Authenticating a Centrelink customer for a detailed process.

If the customer receives Farm Household Allowance (FHA) and the staff member is:

• not trained in FHA, transfer customer to the Farmer Assistance hotline
• on the Farmer Assistance hotline and not trained in Urgent Payments, contact Local Peer Support (LPS)

If the customer contacts in person, they must be authenticated at application. It is preferable they provide at least 1 photo identity document for a comparison.

If this is not available and the Service Officer doubts they are speaking with the customer, they must ask more authentication questions. These must not be limited to details their friends and relatives know such as their date of birth or how many children are in the family. The questions must be searching, but must not be so personal as to be intrusive. If appropriate, explain to the customer why they are being asking these questions. See Authenticating a Centrelink customer for a detailed process

If this occurs, the customer is requesting a new urgent payment. As the customer has already had an urgent payment granted, they cannot request another urgent payment on the same day.

All urgent payment requests must be processed by the Immediate Payment requests script with the exception for Farm Household Allowance (FHA).

If the customer is receiving FHA, go to Step 4.

For all other customers:

• In Customer Record, open the Script Selector menu
• Select immediate payment requests script and click the Run Script button
• Then follow the prompts - the script will complete the activity and record a DOC including:
• the outcome and reason for the immediate payment request
• the documents or verifiable evidence provided by the customer (if needed)
• the amount (limited to $200 for an urgent payment and $1,000 for an immediate payment due to agency delay) and method of payment
• any other help offered or referrals made

Note: the Immediate Payment request script will pause on the Issue Future Payment (IFP) screen to allow insertion of the correct reason. Once the correct code has been input press [Enter], then click OK on the script.

Is the Immediate Payment request script available?

• Yes, go to Step 5
• No, where system problems prevent the use of the script, the payment must be manually coded, see Step 1 in Table 2

Issue the immediate payment by Direct Credit using the Issue Urgent Payment guided procedure.

In the Issue Urgent Payment guided procedure:

• Confirm the correct bank account details are displaying in the Customer Information section
• Reason for Issue - Enter the details
• Amount field - Enter the minimum amount needed to meet the customer’s immediate need
• Select the Payment Method ‘Direct Credit’ from the drop down
• Select Continue
• Confirm to proceed with the Urgent Payment in the pop-up

Record the decision on a DOC.

Tell the customer that the payment will be delivered to their bank account:

• the next working day for payments in the Newstart system, or
• in 2 working days for other payments

The payment should be coded manually only when the Immediate Payment request script is unavailable.

• On the Payment Summary (PS) screen in the customer's record key 'R' against the payment to be actioned, the press [Enter]
• The Issue Payment Select (IPPRE) screen will open
• Select the type of issue payment by coding an 'S' beside Early payment from current Pay Period: field
• Select destination type by coding an 'S' in the Default Destination: field. Press [Enter]. (If deductions exist, these will be taken from the remaining amount)

All fields must be coded:

• In the Issue Amount: field enter the amount to be paid (it cannot exceed the available amount)
• The Reason: for crisis payment and urgent payment grants use field help '?' to change the reason to:
• DEP-Departmental Delay
• ECI-Extraordinary Circumstances
• EXC-Exceptional and Unforeseen
• FNL-Funeral Expenses
• CRI-Crisis Payment
• For any payment reason that falls outside of the above, choose the most appropriate reason from the list available in the field help. More details about the appropriate code reasons is available on the Resources tab
• In the Finished (Y/Q/N): field, key 'Y'
• In the Notes: field record the reason for the urgent payment. This will create a DOC
• Complete the Source: and DOR: fields, and press [Enter]
• The Immediate payment will be recorded on the PS screen
• Record all details on a DOC including:
• the outcome and reason for the immediate payment request
• the documents or verifiable evidence provided by the customer (if needed)
• the amount (limited to $200 for an urgent payment and $1,000 for an immediate payment due to agency delay) and method of payment
• any other help offered or referrals made
• a reference to SSAA 1999 Section 55 (payment into bank account etc) can be included, but as payment delivery is not the significant decision, it is not compulsory