Eligibility for Parental Leave Pay (PPL) as a primary claimant for children born or entering care before 1 July 2023 007-09020010

A primary claimant may receive up to 18 weeks of PPL. Any unused PPL may be payable to an eligible secondary/tertiary claimant, for example, their partner.

It can be taken before, after or at the same time as:

• employer-provided paid or unpaid maternity or parental leave, or
• other leave entitlements (such as annual leave or long service leave)

PPL is made up a PPL period of up to 18 weeks (90 payable days), and consists of:

• a PPL period of up to 12 weeks (60 payable days), plus
• 30 Flexible PPL days

Primary claimants will most often be the birth mother, or initial primary carer of an adopted or surrogate child. If exceptional circumstances exist (for example, the parents of the child are incapacitated and the grandparents become the primary carer of the child), someone else may be eligible for PPL under the exceptional circumstances criteria.

Customers who do not meet all of the eligibility to be paid PPL under the exceptional circumstances provisions may still be eligible for PPL as a secondary claimant under exceptional circumstances. For example, the grandparent is the primary carer of the child but does not met the work test. They may be able to claim the remainder of the PPL that was not paid to the initial primary claimant.

In some instances, PPL may be payable to a new primary claimant after the birth mother/primary carer has received PPL payments.

Where a customer has met the PPL exceptional circumstances eligibility and another person has previously been paid PPL for the child, a manual override code of APC-Additional Primary Claimant will need to be coded by a families override officer to enable payment.

Families override officers should refer to Recording overrides for Paid Parental Leave scheme claims for details about the override coding.

To receive PPL as a primary claimant, a person must:

• be the primary carer of a Parental Leave Pay (PPL) child. Exception: This does not apply:
• after a child has died or was stillborn, or
• if care of the child is lost without legal authority
• have a child born or entered care before 1 July 2023
• meet the PPL work test
• meet the PPL income test. For the PPL income test threshold, see Paid Parental Leave - income limits
• notify that they have applied to register the child's birth. Exception: This does not apply if the child is:
• adopted
• stillborn
• born outside Australia, or
• entrusted to care as part of a surrogacy arrangement
• meet Australian residence requirements

Additionally, the primary claimant must:

• not have returned to work since becoming the primary carer of the child to be eligible for the PPL period
• not be working on days that they want to claim Flexible PPL Exceptions apply in some circumstances.

Note: surrogate birth mothers and birth mothers adopting out children or legally losing custody may not return to work and continue to receive the PPL period. Flexible PPL days can continue to be paid on days the customer is not working, if these days are not more than 18 weeks following the child’s birth. See: Claiming payments for children entrusted to care as part of the process of adoption or surrogacy.

PPL is not payable for children in a customer’s care as part of a formal foster care or kinship care arrangement.

PPL can be payable:

• for formal foster carers who have had the child come into their care as part of the adoption process, where the placement is for the purpose of the adoption
• in an informal foster care relationship where the child has entered care in exceptional circumstances

PPL can be taken before, after or at the same time as employer-provided paid or unpaid maternity or parental leave, or other leave entitlements (such as annual leave or long service leave).

If the customer has returned to work since becoming the primary carer of the child, they:

• will not be eligible for the PPL period after the return to work date, but may be able to transfer some or all of their PPL period to a secondary claimant
• may be eligible for 30 Flexible PPL days, if the child’s birth or adoption is on or after 1 July 2020
• may be eligible for some or all of the PPL period if they meet the PPL extended work test and the nominated start date is before their return to work date

Note: customers may participate in up to 10 'keeping in touch' days prior to returning to work, but not within 14 days after the day the child was born.

Return to work exceptions apply in some circumstances, including bereavement. See Parental Leave Pay (PPL) customer, for a child born before 1 July 2023, returns to work.

Flexible PPL can be paid after the customer has returned to work. However, it cannot be paid on a day that the customer is performing paid work unless an exception applies.

Full transfer of the PPL period

If the primary claimant is transferring their full PPL period to a secondary claimant, the primary claimant needs to meet the PPL eligibility criteria from the child’s date of birth/adoption until the day before primary care of the child is transferred to the secondary claimant.

When the transfer of primary care date is:

• the child’s date of birth/adoption, the primary claimant is only required to meet the limited PPL eligibility criteria. The secondary claimant must meet the full eligibility criteria from the child’s date of birth/adoption to the end of the PPL period
• after the child is born (or enters care), the primary claimant must meet the full PPL eligibility criteria for each day from the date the child is born (or enters care) until the day before primary care is transferred to the secondary claimant. The secondary claimant must satisfy the full PPL eligibility criteria for each day from the date primary care is transferred to them until the end of the PPL period.

Where the birth mother or initial primary claimant meets the limited eligibility criteria (for example has returned to work before submitting their PPL claim), the claim must NOT be assessed until both the primary and secondary claimants have:

• submitted a claim for PPL
• claims ‘STArted’ or ‘ASS-PCB’
• not had a payability determination made for PPL (i.e. rejected/assessed or granted claim) for the child

This process is required to ensure the primary and secondary claimant’s PPL periods line up.

If the secondary claimant's record is not linked to or is in a different Centrelink environment to that of the primary carer, a workaround for PPL secondary claimants may be required.

Partial transfer of PPL period

For a partial transfer, the primary claimant’s period and secondary claimant’s period must be a continuous period with no break in eligibility.

Primary claimants transferring some (but not all) of their PPL period to a secondary claimant must meet the full PPL eligibility criteria from the child’s date of birth/adoption to the end of their PPL period (transfer date). The secondary claimant must satisfy the full PPL eligibility criteria for each day from the date primary care of the child is transferred to them until the end of their PPL period.

Flexible PPL days

The primary claimant can choose to give permission for another person (secondary claimant) to claim some or all of their Flexible PPL days.

The secondary claimant is required to lodge their own PPL claim to nominate these days. A secondary claimant’s claim for Flexible PPL days can be lodged up to 2 years after the child’s birth or adoption. However, PPL claims that include a full or partial transfer of the PPL period must be lodged within one year of the child’s birth or adoption and there are time limits for claiming the maximum PPL period.

The primary claimant can remove permission:

• at any time during the pre-birth phase (pre-birth claims only), or
• before a secondary claimant has claimed the Flexible PPL day

For the purposes of claiming Flexible PPL days, multiple secondary claimants can be linked to a child.

Customers are encouraged to lodge an early claim for family assistance and Parental Leave Pay (PPL). It is important they are aware of the time limits for claiming the maximum PPL period.

For all primary claimants, PPL claims must be lodged before the:

• child's first birthday, or
• first anniversary of the day:
• the primary claimant became the primary carer for exceptional circumstances
• the child becomes entrusted to the customer's care for adoptions, or
• the child enters care for a surrogacy arrangement

The PPL period is only payable for days before:

• the child’s first birthday, or
• the first anniversary of the child’s entry to care in the case of adoption
• first anniversary of the child's entry into care for a surrogacy arrangement

Flexible PPL is only paid on days after the end of the PPL period and before the child's:

• second birthday, or
• second anniversary of the day the child is entrusted into care for adoption/a surrogacy arrangement

Note: if a customer indicates they are claiming PPL because someone is transferring PPL to them, they will be assessed as a secondary claimant. The primary claimant will need to be located and the claims matched up to ensure the correct PPL period dates can be determined. If the primary claim has not already been assessed, or if the secondary claimant is claiming the full entitlement, the claims will need to be assessed together. See Eligibility for Parental Leave Pay (PPL) as a primary claimant for children born or entering care before 1 July 2023.

When claiming PPL, primary claimants must nominate a start date for their PPL period.

The PPL period start date:

• can be no earlier than the child’s date of birth or the date the child entered care
• is determined once the customer provides the child's proof of birth or proof of entry into care
• can be backdated to the child’s date of birth/adoption if:
• the customer claims and provides proof of birth within 28 days of the child’s birth/adoption, or
• if they meet the PPL extended work test due to coronavirus (COVID-19)

See Paid Parental Leave scheme Work Test.

A customer's nominated start date or PPL period start date is not the date that the customer will receive their first payment. However, the customer's first PPL period instalment will be backdated to their PPL period start date.

See Determining a customer’s Paid Parental Leave (PPL) period start date for children born or entering care before 1 July 2023.

Note: for customers that are not eligible for the PPL period, their PPL will start on the first Flexible PPL day.

Multiple birth

For a multiple birth, PPL can only be paid for one child and the higher rate of NBS/NBU may be paid for the other children. However, if there was a significant delay between the births of the children from the same pregnancy, for example twins delivered 5+ days apart, the births may be considered separate birthing events and not part of a multiple birth. If approved these cases may qualify to be payable for each child. Cases with evidence of multiple birth with significant delay should be forwarded to the Families level 2 helpdesk for assessment.

Where multiple children are adopted as part of the same adoption process, PPL is only payable for one child.

Assessable income

Parental Leave Pay Scheme payments are:

• taxable income and are included in a customer's adjusted taxable income for family assistance payments
• treated as ordinary income for calculating the rate of payment for income support payments

Note: Service Officers do not code the PPL income on the customer’s record. It will be automatically included for assessment when the PPL claim is actioned. See Coding income and assets for Centrelink payments and services for more information.

Any PPL payments are taken into consideration as income for customers claiming or renewing a Low Income Health Care Card.

Eligibility for other payments

Customers (and/or their partner) cannot receive Family Tax Benefit (FTB) Part B at the same time as PPL.

Customers cannot receive:

• JobKeeper Payment for the same period they receive PPL
• PPL and NBS/NBU for the same child. However, customers may change their claim choice and claim PPL after NBS/NBU has been paid. Any NBS/NBU paid to the customer will have to be repaid

After a stillbirth, customers who are not eligible for PPL may claim Stillborn Baby Payment (SBP).

PPL and DAP interaction

One customer could receive PPL and DAP for the same child, however:

• the PPL and DAP periods must have been taken at different times, and
• a maximum of 18 weeks can be paid to the one person

Note: usually only the secondary claimant could claim PPL and DAP, as the primary claimant was generally not eligible for DAP.

A family could receive a maximum of 20 weeks PPL and DAP combined for the same child. For example, the primary claimant received 18 weeks of PPL and their partner received 2 weeks of DAP.

A customer could receive PPL for one child and DAP for another child at the same time.