Conducting a social work child support exemption due to fear of family and domestic violence or other circumstances 003-12050010

Services Australia has a zero tolerance approach to child abuse.

A staff member must act when they see or hear behaviour which raises concern about a child or young person’s safety. Follow the agency's Risk Identification and Reporting model when identifying and responding to child safety concerns. See Risk identification and management of threats to the safety or welfare of a child.

Refer customers who cannot take action to apply for and/or get child support because of fear of family and domestic violence or other circumstances (such as cultural or other complex circumstances), to a social worker. The social worker can assess their eligibility for an exemption. The assessment can be done jointly with an Indigenous Service Officer (ISO) or Multicultural Service Officer (MSO), if appropriate.

Social workers have 21 days to complete this assessment. The Service Officer must code a temporary exemption (MXR) at the point of first contact pending this decision.

Social workers must make sure customers understand that:

• child support is for the financial benefit of the child and the parent caring for the child
• child support improves the financial resources for children not living with both parents and can be received until the child turns 18 years old
• children are entitled to receive support from both parents
• child support does not have to involve contact between the parents
• Child Support can act as a mediator and collect on behalf of a parent

For customers with a private collect child support case, consider the benefits of opting in to Child Support Collection.

Discuss the disbursement method with the customer before considering an exemption, where the customer:

• has elected for Child Support to collect on their behalf, and
• is not getting any child support, or
• Is getting less than their child support assessed amount

A partial exemption may be granted where:

• the customer is unable to collect their full entitlement but it is not appropriate for them to transfer the responsibility of collection to Child Support, or
• there is a retrospective increase to their private collect child support assessment and they:
• are unable to collect the arrears from the payer, and
• provide a letter from a legal practitioner advising they cannot help the customer as it would not be cost effective to do so
• the customer:
• does not have a current child support case, and
• is being voluntarily paid by the other parent (cash or non-cash), and
• fears that taking action to seek child support will cause the other parent to react violently

A partial exemption enables the customer to collect whatever they can privately (or to be re-reconciled on the amount they actually received). Their rate of FTB Part A is based on the amount of child support they actually receive rather than the amount of the child support assessment.

Partial exemptions are not available for customers with a Child Support collect case.

The social worker should fully explore with the customer avenues for verifying the grounds for an exemption, such as advice or verification provided by:

• health professionals
• community agencies
• legal practitioners
• police
• relatives
• friends

If the circumstances existed previously, exemptions may be backdated.

Backdating an exemption may be appropriate for instalment customers or lump sum customers who are collecting child support privately or customers who do not have an existing child support case.

Grounds for backdating an exemption are established through an assessment of whether the circumstances existed before the date of claim for the entire backdated period.

Special circumstances do not need to be established to backdate an exemption to 1 July of the previous financial year. However, in order to backdate any further, special circumstances for backdating a maintenance action exemption must first be established.

Backdating an exemption for a customer who was not previously meeting the MAT may result in arrears of FTB.

See Exemptions from seeking child support for Family Tax Benefit (FTB) customers.

In cases where arrears generate and the customer has an existing debt, consider whether a temporary exclusion from debt recovery is required where exceptional or unforeseen circumstances exist.

See:

• Debt Offsetting during Family Assistance reassessment, reconciliation and claim processing
• Temporary write off of Centrelink debts

Customers, who have an active child support case and are granted a full MAT exemption must have that case ended by Child Support. If the case is not ended, the exemption is of no benefit to the customer, as the Maintenance Income Test will continue to affect their FTB. Child Support will also continue to send letters to the other parent. If the case is Child Support collect, Child Support will continue to pursue unpaid child support. This may place the customer at risk of further violence or harm.

Social workers must:

• discuss ending the case with the customers, and
• warm transfer the customer to Child Support via the Parent Support Team

If this is not possible, social workers must email the Parent Support Team using the ‘Maintenance Exemption Notification to Child Support Program’ template. See Resources page for the template.

Note: make sure all contact details for the customer are correct in Customer First.

As the customer has been granted a full exemption, the discharge of arrears has no impact on their Family Tax Benefit entitlements. Ending a child support case is only possible for a specified date that occurs after the date the election is made.

Shared or divided care in family and domestic violence cases

If the care of the child/ren is shared or divided between the parties to a child support case a parent can elect to end the child support assessments for:

• any child/ren for whom they are assessed to receive child support from the other parent
• any child/ren for whom they have 65% care (or more) even if their child support entitlement is $0
• all children of the case if the assessed annual rate of child support for both parties is $0 and the parent has an exemption due to family and domestic violence

Where the annual rate of child support payable is greater than $0 for either party, the carer entitled to receive child support (receiving parent) can only end the child support assessment for the child/ren in their care.

This could result in the receiving parent becoming the paying parent for the children in the other parent’s care. If ending the case might create further family and domestic violence or may result in the receiving parent becoming the paying parent, a partial exemption may be considered but only if the child support case is private collect.

Note: if an FTB customer is or would be the paying parent, they are considered as having taken reasonable maintenance action for a child by having the children in their care taken into account in the child support case. Conversely, when a receiving parent has a domestic violence exemption granted, the alleged perpetrator is still entitled to apply for child support if:

• care of the FTB child/ren increases, or
• their adjusted taxable income increases, and
• they become a potential receiving parent

The Level 2 Policy Helpdesk can help if policy advice is needed. See the Resources page for a link.

Social workers must tell customers that a Service Officer from Child Support will need to speak to the customer before ending their case. Child Support can only end the case from a day after the customer speaks to a Service Officer and makes the election to end the assessment.

Exception

In some cases, 2 carers may be entitled to child support for the same child. For example, a grandparent and a parent. In these cases, a joint election to end the case is required from both carers. Where a joint election cannot be obtained from both carers and there is family violence involved, it may be appropriate to discuss a partial exemption for the parent carer as an alternative option to ending the case.

There is no Maintenance Action Test requirement in respect of a non-parent carer and an exemption is therefore not required for them. The Level 2 Policy Helpdesk can help if policy advice is needed. See the Resources page for a link.

If the customer has an active child support case and is granted a full exemption, the customer can elect to end their child support case. If the customer does not elect to end their child support case, the exemption will not have any effect.

The start date of the exemption has no impact on the date the child support case is ended. The earliest date Child Support can end the case is from the day after they speak to the customer.

Example: social worker has an appointment with the customer 22/09/20 and backdates a full exemption to 01/07/19 due to violence. The customer is unable to speak to Child Support to end their case on 22/09/20. The social worker sends through a referral to Child Support to contact the customer to discuss ending their case. Child Support successfully contact the customer on 01/10/20 and the customer confirms they want to end their case. Child Support end the case from the date of contact with the customer, which was 01/10/20.

As part of the election to end, the customer may choose to discharge any child support arrears owing. This has no impact on the MIT.

Customers who are granted an exemption from taking maintenance action because of fear of family and domestic violence, may have the exemption reviewed at the discretion of a social worker. A future review will:

• re-establish the customer's circumstances at that time, and
• determine if the exemption from taking child support action due to fear of family and domestic violence is still appropriate

If a social worker deems a future review is appropriate, the Service Officer must manually record the review. This is done using the Review Registration (RVR) screen, at the time the exemption is coded.