Raising debts for students and Australian Apprentices 107-09120060

When a customer fails to notify a change of circumstance, they may receive payments they are not entitled to. This may occur for:

• students who:
• ceased study, but continued to receive Youth Allowance (student) or Austudy while not entitled
• reduce their study load to part-time, but continued to receive Youth Allowance (student) or Austudy while not entitled
• Australian Apprentices who:
• cease their apprenticeship and no longer have a current Commonwealth Registration Number, but continued to receive Youth Allowance (Apprentice) or Austudy (Apprentice) while not entitled
• reduce their hours to part-time, but continued to receive Youth Allowance (Apprentice) or Austudy (Apprentice) while not entitled
• Pensioner Education Supplement (PES) customers who:
• ceased study, but continued to receive PES while not entitled
• continued to be paid their PES qualifying income support payment while not entitled

Has an undetermined debt been created for a Youth Allowance (Student) or Austudy (Student) due to failing to notify the agency of a change in circumstance?

• Yes, the undetermined debt(s) will be actioned by Debt Staff. Procedure ends here
• No, and the undetermined debt(s) relate to:
• an Australian Apprentice, go to Step 2
• a Centrelink Academic Reassessment Transformation review (CART), go to Step 3
• a Pensioner Education Supplement (PES), go to Step 4
• a Student Payment Review, see Processing Student Payment Circumstance Updates (Student Payment Reviews)

For Apprentice processing staff only.

Where the customer’s Commonwealth Registration Number in Apprenticeships Data Management System (ADMS) is no longer current and the customer has received an Australian Apprenticeship payment, an undetermined debt will be created in some circumstances.

Service Officers processing an Apprentice debt must ensure all the appropriate actions have been taken on the customer's record.

Can the undetermined Apprentice debt be actioned?

• Yes, go to Step 6
• No, further updates are required, see Customer no longer an Australian Apprentice

For CART processing staff only.

To ensure a correct reassessment of the customer’s payment is undertaken, staff must investigate entitlement dating back to the last date the customer lost qualification for a student payment. There are 3 dates relevant to CART reviews:

• Date of Withdrawal (DOW)
• Date of effect (DOE)
• Date of Load (DOL)

When an undetermined debt shell has been created as a result of a CART review assessment, a Service Officer trained in actioning CART reviews must make 2 genuine attempts to contact the customer when they are making an unfavourable decision.

Make 2 genuine attempts to contact the customer and ask the date the study details changed.

If contact is successful and the date provided by the customer is:

• equal to or earlier than that is provided by the Educational Institution, accept this date
• after the date provided by the Educational Institution, this can only be used if verification is provided

If contact is unsuccessful and the date provided by the Education Institution is accepted:

• if an education institution has:
• provided a date of withdrawal, use this date
• provided no date of withdrawal, but a date of effect is provided in the match data, use the date of effect as the date of event

Where neither a withdrawal date or date of effect are present in the match data, use the initial load date.

Note: the CART load dates can be viewed in the Selection Intervention Management System (SIMS). Staff must not tell the customer the load date or date of effect given by the educational institution.

See Processing Centrelink Academic Reassessment Transformation (CART) reviews for an example of the date to use when raising a debt resulting from a CART review.

Go to Step 7.

For PES processing staff only.

An undetermined PES debt may be created where a PES customer has:

• continued to receive PES while not entitled, or
• continued to be paid their PES qualifying payment while not entitled

Check the payment status of the customer’s PES, as well as the qualifying payment. Service Officers processing a PES debt must ensure all the appropriate actions have been taken on the customer's record based on the reason for the undetermined debt.

If the undetermined PES debt relates to a loss of entitlement to the qualifying payment, any debt related to the qualifying payment needs to be determined before the PES debt can be actioned.

Can the undetermined PES debt be actioned?

• Yes, go to Step 6
• No, go to Step 5

A PES debt cannot be actioned where the qualifying income support payment debt has not yet been determined.

Service Officers processing the PES debt must:

• place the PES debt activity on hold for 28 days
• send a Fast Note to the relevant debt area, see the Resources page of Debt ownership
• record details of the action required in the Fast Note including that the outstanding PES debt cannot be assessed until the Income Support Payment debt is actioned

Procedure ends here.

Go to the Document List (DL) screen. Locate any DOC related to the undetermined debt:

• find the DOC titled Debt Investigation (if available). The information:
• may help as a starting point
• is an estimate at a point in time
• consider other factors that may impact the debt outcome, for example:
• the presence of limiting dates
• other waived or determined debts on the Debt List (OPDL) screen where any date overlaps the undetermined debt
• manual and automatic adjustments, etc.
• follow Business As Usual (BAU) debt investigation and raising processes
• see Using the correct date of effect when raising debts

Service Officers with the appropriate skills must:

• calculate the amount of the overpayment
• raise the debt by actioning an undetermined debt on the Debt Management and Information System (DMIS)
• complete the Modify/Assess (OPMA) screen. See the Resources page for the codes:
• Reason field
• Benefit Type Section of Act field. To complete other fields, use field help ('?') for assistance
• press [Enter]
• send the Account Payable letter to the customer
• finalise the activity and note the Debt ID, go to Step 5

Record details of the decision regarding a debt on a DOC. Include:

• the Debt ID number in the summary line, and
• all relevant legislation and policy guideline references in the text

Did the excess payment (negative adjustment) match the overpayment amount raised?

• Yes, adjustment of the Payment Summary is not required
• No, adjust the tax details