Restoration of Youth Allowance (YA) or Austudy for full-time students and Australian Apprentices 102-10040180

The subsequent claim can be considered an application for review of the original payment cancellation if:

• the customer has had their YA or Austudy cancelled, and
• they submit a subsequent claim within 13 weeks of the date they were notified of the cancellation

Is the customer cancelled or suspended WUK?

• Yes, go to Step 7
• No, go to Step 3

Service Officers are to determine if the payment can be restored on initial contact.

• Go to the Service Reason Summary (SRS) screen or the Allowance/Benefit History (ABH) screen to view suspension/cancellation code
• Go to the Benefit Status (XBS) screen to check for suspensions that may have occurred before cancellation, which will also need to be resolved
• Check the list of rejection/suspension and cancellation codes, find the relevant code and check if restorable

Smart centre staff should only continue with this procedure if the suspension/cancellation reason is restorable by smart centre Service Officer.

Note: rejections can never be restored. The reclaim process must be used.

Is this reason restorable?

• Yes, go to Step 4
• No, go to Step 5

Determine how long it has been since the customer was notified of the suspension or cancellation. The customer notification can be located on the History Summary (HS) screen, or in the ACE system.

Note: consider how the customer was notified of the decision (online or regular mail). For details on the delivery date of notices, see Customer initiated review of decision.

• If the period between the notification of the suspension/cancellation and the customer contact is:
• more than 13 weeks, go to Step 5
• less than 13 weeks, go to Step 6
• If the payment is cancelled and the customer is not requesting restoration but has a FRP (Failed to Report) debt, see Table 2, Step 4

Payment cannot be restored. The customer will need to test their eligibility and reclaim payment. Service Officers must tell the customer of claiming procedures. See Contact in relation to an intended claim.

In some cases restoration may occur for cancellation reasons WUK (whereabouts unknown). This is because the customer would be taken not to have received advice of the decision to suspend/cancel, if they were:

• not at their known address, and/or
• advice of the decision was returned to Services Australia

This means that the date of effect of the favourable determination (restoration) resulting from review of the decision to suspend/cancel is the date of the original decision (date of suspension/cancellation), as per Legislation.

Each customer’s circumstances must be looked at individually to decide if they:

• could be taken not to have received advice of the decision to suspend/cancel, and
• retained qualification and payability during the period, and therefore receive arrears upon restoration

If decision is:

• to restore payment with arrears, go to Step 6
• not to restore, tell the customer of claiming procedures. See Contact in relation to an intended claim. Procedure ends here

Determine if the payment can be restored on initial contact.

Check the customer’s Document List (DL) screen for a DOC about the cancellation/suspension.

For customers requesting restoration of their income support payment within 13 weeks of a CAN/DNL, CAN/FRP or CAN/CLR, Service Officers can review the cancellation determination and restore the customer's payment where the customer:

• has a good reason for not meeting reporting, when they were required to until the date they have actually reported, and
• was entitled to payment during the period, and
• has established continuing ongoing entitlement

Careful consideration of the customer’s circumstance should be given if a customer has a history of cancelling due to failure to report. Appropriate efforts to verify the customer’s statement should be made before restoring their payment (for example, third party calls and/or written evidence from the customer).

It is generally not possible to restore the payments unless the cancellation was in error and/or it can be determined that the customer has continued to meet their student requirements or continued to be a full-time Australian Apprentice since last paid. The customer should be asked how they have supported themselves since last paid by Services Australia, for example, Have they worked? Have they used liquid assets?

More action is needed for some suspension/cancellation reasons:

• Suspended ATR (Allowable Time Reached), go to Step 8
• For other suspension or cancellation reasons, go to Step 9

In some cases restoration may occur for cancellation reason WUK, even if the customer has contacted more than 13 weeks after the notice of suspension/cancellation was sent.

This is because if the customer would be taken not to have received advice of the decision to suspend/cancel, if they were:

• not at their known address and/or
• advice of the decision was returned to Services Australia

The date of effect of the favourable decision (restoration) resulting from the review of the decision to suspend/cancel is the date of the original decision (date of suspension/cancelation), as per Legislation.

Each customer’s circumstance must be looked at individually to decide if they:

• could be taken not to have received advice of the decision, and
• retained qualification and payability during the period

If the decision is:

• not to restore, DOC the record with the reason for the decision and tell the customer of claiming procedures. See Contact in relation to an intended claim. Procedure ends here
• to restore payments, confirm address details with the customer:
• If the customer's address details have not changed, but mail has been returned, proof of address details are needed before restoration of payment can occur. Procedure ends here until verification received
• If the customer advises their new address details or if the previous address details had been coded incorrectly, update/correct the address details and then payment can be restored
• Go to the Address History (ADH) screen and 'D'elete the 'Address Type Ended' line. This will remove the end date from the current address
• Update the address, and
• Reissue the returned correspondence
• See Table 2, Step 2

For customers whose payments have been suspended with reason ATR (Allowable Time Reached), staff must follow the appropriate procedure as follows:

For Austudy:

• Assessing secondary students satisfactory progress for Austudy
• Assessing satisfactory progress for tertiary students for Austudy

For Youth Allowance:

• Assessing satisfactory progress for Youth Allowance (YA) secondary students
• Assessing satisfactory progress for Youth Allowance (YA) tertiary students

• If the cancellation reason is FRP (Failed to Report), customers do not need to attend the Service Centre to provide proof of income, or confirm that activity requirements have been met. If the customer can provide details via the phone:
• restoration should be actioned at the time of contact
• outstanding reports should be processed, and
• payment stimulated
• To code employment income in the same activity as a restoration, see Recording and correcting employment income details. For CAN-FRP, procedure ends here:
• Continuing/intending students under the age of 22 who fail to notify new course details before their current course end date, will automatically have their activity type changed to a job seeker. Once this occurs, if the customer tries to update their study details online, they will be advised that the service is not available. These customers must call the agency to give their new study details. See Satisfying the full-time study requirements for customers intending to study for Youth Allowance (YA)
• For CAN/CLR, since cancellation, check if the customer:
• remained eligible for the payment
• is still enrolled in the same course or changed courses
• had any income to report
• became partnered or separated

Does the customer need to give any details or documents, attend an interview, or meet any other requirement before payment can be restored or, is there any other details that prevents customer's record being restored and actioned at first contact?

• Yes, tell the customer to attend their local Service Centre. See Table 2, Step 1
• No, and the payment:
• Is to be restored, see Table 2, Step 2
• Is not to be restored, see Table 2, Step 4

Has the customer supplied required information or taken necessary action to be restored and can the payment be restored?

• Yes, restore the payment. Go to Step 2
• No,
• tell the customer that payment cannot be restored until the required action has been taken. Procedure ends here
• if it is not appropriate to restore the customer's payment due to decision or qualification reasons, go to Step 4

If the customer is under income management (INM on the benefit status line) and they have an arrears or lump sum payment entitlement, the Service Officer is not to make any changes to the customer's record to allow this payment to be made. The Service Officer is to contact the Income Management Team to allow income management to be turned on for the arrears payment before it is made.

Check the customer is still eligible for payment and determine date of restart. Some cancellation and suspension codes allow a gap in entitlement, otherwise restoration will take place from Date paid to plus one day (DPT+1). See Cancellation, Suspension and Rejection reason codes.

If the customer was imprisoned, and:

• their payments are suspended (SUS-IMP), payments can be restored from the date of release providing they contact within 13 weeks of the suspension of their payment and they meet their study requirements or have resumed their Australian Apprenticeship, go to Step 3
• is under 22 years of age and they are no longer a student or Australian Apprentice, or their payment has been cancelled, they will need to test their eligibility for an income support payment. Go to Step 4

Confirm with customer if there have been any changes of circumstances they should advise - update accordingly.

If the customer's Family Tax Benefit (FTB) is cancelled as a result of the income support payment being suspended/cancelled, restore FTB first where rent assistance is paid with the FTB. Go to Step 3.

Update the customer's record

• If the customer had lodged a subsequent claim, view the Claim Summary to determine if any changes need to be applied to the customer's record
• If the customer is returning to an Australian Apprenticeship following imprisonment, a check will need to be made to determine if the customer has a current Commonwealth Registration Number. If a check is required, create a Fast Note - select Auto text, use Students, ABSTUDY and Apprentices > Update > YAL/AUS apprentice action required. Include:
• dates of imprisonment
• that confirmation of a current Commonwealth Registration Number is needed
• If it is appropriate to restore the customer, go to the Benefit Action (BA) screen:
• Enter the type of benefit in the Svc Rsn: field and enter 'RES' in the Action: field
• Press [Enter] and the effect date will default, or enter the effect date of the restoration in the Event Date: field
• Complete Source: and DOR: fields
• If a customer contacts within 13 weeks of the decision, but the date of cancellation or suspension is outside of 15 weeks, Service Officers will receive error E268NS
• If E268NS - Effect date cannot be more than 15 weeks from DOR occurs, change the DOR to 14 weeks and 6 days from the cancellation effect date
• Confirm the study details for the customer are correct by checking the Education Course Details (EDC) screen and the Newstart Education Status (NES) screen. Update the course and student status, if needed
• If the customer is income managed under the Voluntary Income Management measure, and the agreement was in place for more than 13 weeks, the Voluntary Income Management Continuation Assessment page is presented. The purpose of this screen is to record if the customer wishes to continue or terminate their VIM agreement. See Effect on income management when payment is suspended, on zero rate or cancelled, or Unemployment Non-Payment Period applied
• If PLDP has been paid since payment stopped this indicates the customer is working:
• place the customer on 2WE reporting
• do not include any PLDP in outstanding reports
• to be eligible for PLDP customers cannot be receiving income support follow the process for when the PLDP payment was incorrectly paid in Step 3 in Table 5 of Processing Pandemic Leave Disaster Payment claims in Process Direct
• Go to the Assessment Results (AR) screen and check if customer is entitled to any arrears and that they appear correctly on the AR screen. For help, see How to manually calculate arrears. Note: if a payment has been suspended, then later cancelled for a different reason, it will revert to the previous benefit status. Multiple restoration activities may be required
• Finalise the activity
• The benefit will be restored from the date of effect and a letter will be generated advising the customer that their benefit has been restored
• Close any documents uploaded by the customer about the restoration, see Viewing Centrelink customer's digital images
• Record details on a DOC. Include action taken and advice given to customer, and of any changes in circumstances that have been recorded
• If the customer has lodged a subsequent claim, mark the new claim as 'Not Required'

Procedure ends here.

If the decision is not to restore, document the customer's record with the decision and tell the customer of claiming procedures. See Contact in relation to an intended claim.

If the customer has a CAN/FRP debt, the debt amount can be recalculated if there is eligibility for part or all of the debt period. All employment details must be correctly coded in order for the debt to be accurately reassessed. See Recording and correcting employment income details. Any changes to circumstances, assets or investments must also be updated.

Create a Fast Note - select Auto text, use Debts > Debt Raising > Debt Raising ACTion DOC Request. Include:

• Austudy/YA income accepted debt amount to be reassessed
• dates (from xx to xx) for the period information was provided
• details of any updates, for example, Employment Income Summary (EANS) updated
• debt id to be reassessed
• customer has been notified of outcome

Procedure ends here.