Common and specialised activities for Child Support staff 277-01100020

• Discuss the importance of a correct assessment and updating incomes where new information is available, and
• Negotiate payment of overdue child support with payers, or
• Gather collection information from payees where the presenting issue is collection
• Negotiate repayment of recoverable overpayments with payees

See Debt repayment.

• General enquiries, for example disbursements, formula
• Explain administrative options
• Update customer details (including email address if required)
• Customer location (tracing)
• External referrals, and
• Level 1 complaint and feedback management

• Update incomes
• Estimates, see Child support estimates
• Estimate reviews, see Child Support estimates review (Post 1 July 2010)
• Post separation income, see Post separation income for Child Support parents
• FAR not to apply, see Fixed annual rate not to apply applications
• MAR not to apply, see Minimum annual rate to nil - Reducing child support assessments
• Care (not disputed), see Change in child support care levels
• Add child/relevant dependant to existing case, see Assessments Cuba Process Help
• A18, see Eighteen year old children extending a child support assessment
• End case, see Ending a Child Support assessment

• Negotiate payment
• Update payment option
• NAP, see Non-agency payment (NAP)
• TRIP, see Tax Refund Intercept Process (TRIP) exceptions
• Debt offset, see Debt offset (CS)
• Opt in
• Opt out, see Collecting child support payments privately and/or discharging arrears
• Manual disbursements, see Disbursements of child support
• Refunds, see Excess cash on a Child Support customer's account
• Consolidated revenue debts, see Child support overpayments and other payee debt
• Excess cash
• Remitting penalties, see Child Support late payment penalties and estimate penalties

• Registrations (including restarts)
• International registrations and restarts, see Registration of overseas maintenance liabilities (excluding New Zealand)
• International assessments, court orders and agreements, and
• International duplicates, see Correcting errors on Child Support cases

• Integrated care, see Integrated care – Complex care
• Restricted Access Customers System - Level 3 (RACS 3)
• International assessment enquiries, and
• Deceased customer management (DCM), see Deceased Child Support customer management
• Incarcerated customers

• Change of assessment applications (COA), see Change of assessment in special circumstances
• Objections to child support decisions, see Child Support Objections
• Agreements/court orders/variations (including registration of initiating child support agreements and section 106A court orders), see Agreements between Child Support customers
• Estimate reconciliations (including review of the year to date income where the estimate has been reconciled), see Child support estimates - Reconcile (from 1 July 2011) or Child Support estimates - Reconcile (pre 1 July 2011)
• Capacity to pay (CTP), and
• Appeals support, see Administrative Review Tribunal (ART) applications against Child Support decisions

• Intensive Collection Services
• Departure Prohibition Orders (DPO), see Departure prohibition orders (DPO) for Child Support customers
• International Intensive Collection Services, see Debt repayment
• Collection for all payers outside of Australia who are not residents of Australia ('INT-out')
• Transmittals, see Transmittal of Child Support information (excluding New Zealand)
• Legal transition, see Managing Child Support customer Debt Enforcement referrals
• Litigation, see Debt Enforcement referrals
• Non pursuit of Debt (NPOD), see Non-pursuit of individual Child Support debts

The Specialist Residency Team makes decisions about residency status. See Residency decisions for Child Support customers.

Withdrawals and returns, see New Zealand Case Management - Withdrawals and returns to NZIR from Child Support

Personalised Services (includes NPODs), see Personalised Services

• Security incident (CIRT) reviews
• Review of ‘potential at risk’ customers correspondence as identified by the Electronic Document Classification Team (EDC)
• Family and domestic violence pilot cohort, see Customer Referral Guidelines (CRG) - Child Suppor

• Level 2 Complaints and ExCCS facilitate resolution of customer complaints and other escalated issues for the Minister, Government and the Australian Community in consultation with team leaders and Service Officers. These will generally not lock customers
• Level 2 Complaints and ExCCS officers will use discretion to determine the best way to resolve a customer complaint. If an officer takes ownership of an issue, the officer will lock the customer and complete all common activities, including Minimum Collection Activity

Decision makers consider Change of assessment (COA) applications and decide if the assessment must change. The decision making process involves considering all circumstances of the case to determine if a change should be made

• Internal decision makers do not lock customers for the duration of finalising a COA application. All internal decision makers will undertake at least Minimum Collection Activity in real time and refer:
• other common or specialised activities to either Mainstream Services Teams or the owning business area for resolution
• follow up required from minimum collection activity, to Mainstream Services
• Contracted decision makers are exempt from minimum collection activity

Note: COA Internal Decision Makers, will undertake full CMA action for real time resolution whilst on a general enquiry telephony call. They do not retain common activities intrays generated from these telephony shifts.

• interpret child support agreements:
• decide whether an agreement is properly made and administrable
• decide how to administer clauses
• decide how to suspend or terminate an agreement, and
• handle the processing of agreements

Agreements Officers lock customers. All Agreements Officers will undertake at least Minimum Collection Activity in real time, and refer:

• other common or specialised activities to either Mainstream Services Teams, or the owning business area for resolution
• follow up required from minimum collection activity to Mainstream Services

Note: Agreement staff will retain common activities intrays generated from general enquiry telephony shifts.

Objections Officers

Provide a formal full merit review for customers who believe Child Support have made a mistake or applied the law incorrectly

All Objection Officers:

• lock customers
• undertake at least Minimum Collection Activity in real time and refer:
• other common or specialised activities to either Mainstream Services Teams or the owning business area for resolution
• follow up is required from minimum collection activity, this will be referred to Mainstream Services

Note: General Objection Officers will undertake full CMA action for real time resolution whilst on a general enquiry telephony call. They do not retain common activity intrays generated from these calls

• Integrated Care teams complete change in care decisions for Services Australia
• Integrated Care teams:
• lock customers in line with existing instructions in the CMA for Child Support
• complete Minimum Collection Activity and common activities while a care decision is in progress, and
• refer outstanding collection or common activities to the owning business area after finalisation of a care decision

• New Customers process and make decisions on new registrations for Services Australia
• New Customers teams:
• lock customers in line with existing instructions in the CMA for Child Support
• complete Minimum Collection Activity and common activities while a new registration is in progress
• refer outstanding collection or common activities not related to the registration to the owning business area after finalisation of the registration, including error corrections

Application to add a child to an existing assessment:

Once the registration has been recorded in Cuba, New Customers Service Officers will create an Add a Child intray on the applicant’s Cuba record. This is to make sure the application is referred to Mainstream Services.

Enabling areas support critical business functions and do not undertake regular and/or direct contact with payers or payees as part of their normal duties. These areas are exempt from the CMA and are:

• Appeals (ART) support team
• Employer services
• Payment services
• Mail handling
• Technical support
• Central authority team (International)
• Centrelink Liaison Unit (CLU)