Maintenance Action Test (MAT) for customers with shared care 277-51070080

Since 1 July 2008, Customer A and Customer B have their levels of care and income taken into account and there is only one child support case. This means that one customer is required to pay, and the other customer will receive child support.

If both parties have had their circumstances taken into account for a child support case, both parties are considered to have met the MAT for the relevant child/ren. However, there is currently no data electronically received from Child Support to indicate that the child/ren in the paying parent's care are meeting the MAT.

Exception: if the customer has not taken reasonable action to change from being the payer under a child support agreement to the payee following a significant change in care, they will fail the MAT. See Maintenance Action Test (MAT) for Family Tax Benefit (FTB) customers for further details on reasonable MAT requirements for these cases.

In the customer's record, update the MAT code to NMA from the date it is determined the customer is not taking reasonable action.

Note: where the payer in a child support agreement increases their level of care to more than 65% takes reasonable action to end a binding agreement and the payee refuses to end the agreement, the payer satisfies MAT requirements. As these cases will already have an MWP (Manual workaround pass) code applied as a result of the 'one case' scenario, the MWP should remain in place. See Maintenance Action Test (MAT) codes for further details.

From the March 2012 release, the introduction of a new automated MAT code results in Payers to a child support case automatically passing the MAT for their child/ren in limited circumstances.

A consequential reassessment may result in the removal of the code. Once removed, the code cannot be manually reinstated. If the customer remains 'payer' to a child support case, 'MWP' (Manual workaround - Pass MAT test) will need to be considered.

A long term solution is not yet available.

If both parents are Family Tax Benefit (FTB) customers, a manual workaround may still be required to prevent the paying parent from being restricted to the base rate of FTB Part A. Customers will be identified on a case by case basis.

• Possible triggers for identifying affected customers:
• The customer contacts to enquire why they have been reduced to base rate when they have taken action
• The customer advises they have contacted Child Support and:
• had their registration refused, or
• were advised that their child support application cannot be accepted as they and their child/ren are already included in a child support case
• A case end is received from Child Support who advise that the customer's details have been taken into account for a child support case and the customer is required to pay child support

Customers who have a case end received from Child Support will need to be followed up as per current procedures.