Away from Home rate for ABSTUDY 010-02060000

Students or Australian Apprentices may be eligible if they meet one of the following criteria. For assessing eligibility, see Assessing Away from Home for ABSTUDY customers.

Tertiary and secondary students and Australian Apprentices

• Travelling time and access between the permanent home and the education provider or employment location make daily travel impossible or unreasonable
• Home conditions are a serious impediment to educational progress
• ABSTUDY customer in state care

Secondary school students only

• Special course requirements
• Limited local school facilities do not offer a full school program
• Student with a disability requires specialist education or facilities
• Itinerant family prevents regular access to education
• Student has been excluded from all local schools
• Student is experiencing racial discrimination at the local education provider
• It would be unreasonable to break a student's continuity of study at a school
• Student is in receipt of a Boarding School, Third-party Indigenous or Transition School Scholarship
• Student permanently residing in 1 of 5 designated Cape York Welfare Reform communities

Tertiary students only

• The student's course of study requires compulsory residence at the institution

Customers can claim the Away from Home (AFH) rate via an ABSTUDY claim.

Existing customers can provide a statement (verbal or written) indicating the criteria they are seeking approval for.

A student or Australian Apprentice approved for the Away from Home (AFH) rate will receive Living Allowance at the higher Away from Home rate.

They may also be eligible for other entitlements to help with costs due to living away from the parental home. This includes:

• Rent Assistance (RA)
• Remote Area Allowance (RAA)
• School Fees Allowance (SFA) Group 2
• ABSTUDY Fares Allowance (FAA)
• Residential Costs Option
• Relocation Scholarship (RS)

Note: an Australian Apprentice is not eligible for SFA, FAA, Residential Costs Option or RS.

The payee for the Away from Home entitlements will depend on the student or Australian Apprentice's study level, age, living arrangements and the allowance type to be paid. The payee may be the:

• student or Australian Apprentice
• parent/guardian
• private board provider
• hostel or boarding school providing the accommodation

During the COVID-19 pandemic, some students were unable to attend or required to leave their term accommodation. Many students transitioned to online study, as face-to-face teaching was unavailable.

Secondary boarding students

Secondary boarding students who were eligible for or receiving the Away from Home (AFH) rate and unable to commence or continue boarding because of COVID-19, remained eligible for the AFH rate as long as:

• the student stayed enrolled/registered for the same boarding arrangement, and
• the student’s boarding spot was held for their return as soon as they could reasonably commence or resume boarding, and
• the school/boarding provider kept in touch with the student and/or their family during this time, and
• if the student usually lived at a boarding school, the school provided the student with the curriculum and necessary educational support and pastoral care to keep the student engaged in remote learning

During this period, the student was considered to be boarding away from home for school attendance.

This also applied to situations where the student did not start or return to school because of community and family concerns around the safety of travel, including the risk of contracting COVID-19.

Tertiary students

Tertiary students who were receiving the AFH rate and temporarily transitioned to online learning because of COVID-19, remained eligible for the AFH rate. To continue to be eligible for the AFH rate, tertiary students must have returned to face-to-face study as soon as it became available.

Where a student had to move out of education provider accommodation (such as on campus) and were temporarily staying at their home address, they remained eligible for the AFH rate providing they:

• remained enrolled in their course of study, and
• intended to return to their campus accommodation as soon as the education provider allowed them to return

In this case, the change in accommodation should be assessed as temporary.