Job seeker compliance for job seekers affected by a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event 001-10040020

PST-skilled staff must reject all failures without investigation where mutual obligation requirements were paused for the job seeker's location regardless of the incident date.

In Process Direct:

• Go to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW) and select the relevant failure from the Outstanding Compliance Action table
• On the Investigation page, in response to the question What reason/s have they given for the failure?, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• In response to the question What is the main excuse for the failure?, select Not required - reject due to system issues
  This will automatically pre-populate the rejection reason Generated in error/unable to action on the Decision and Penalty page
• On the Decision and Penalty page, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• More detail regarding the specific disaster, declared emergency or other significant event may also be recorded
• Finalise the workflow

Generally, the Capability Assessment should be completed at the time of initial contact. Any impacts the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event are likely to have on the job seeker's capacity to meet their current requirements on an ongoing basis should be considered and recorded during the Capability Assessment.

When the job seeker is due to report and it is not possible or appropriate to complete the Capability Assessment due to the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, PST staff may ask the job seeker to call back as soon as possible before or on their next reporting day to complete the assessment.

In these cases, the job seeker has met the re-engagement requirement to arrange a Capability Assessment once:

• the purpose of the Capability Assessment has been explained, and
• privacy provisions have been read

Once this has been completed, update the Capability Assessment using Save and Exit reason Unable to complete today to allow:

• payment restoration to occur, and
• outstanding reporting to be finalised (for current report only)

For the process to Save and Exit a Capability Assessment using the rejection reason Unable to complete today, see Capability Assessments.

If a Community Development Program (CDP) participant contacts from a region or community where a formal pause of mutual obligations has been advised, and their participation payment is suspended reason SUS-ANR, PST-skilled staff must take the following action to manually finalise the NAR:

In Process Direct:

• Go to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW), review the list of completed compliance actions and select the relevant failure
• On the Re-engagement page in the Compliance Investigation workflow, indicate the CDP participant is no longer required to re-engage by changing the re-engagement outcome to No re-engagement, unable to attend appointment or contact provider
• Record free text on the Notes section: 'No re-engagement required as directed by DEWR due to natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event'
• Finalise the workflow

See Restoring payment where a payment suspension (participation) has been imposed for Community Development Program (CDP) participants.

In Process Direct:

• Go to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW) and select the relevant failure from the Outstanding Compliance Action table
• On the Investigation page, in response to the question What reason/s have they given for the failure?, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• In response to the question What is the main excuse for the failure?, select Not required - reject due to system issues
  This will automatically pre-populate the rejection reason Generated in error/unable to action on the Decision and Penalty page
• On the Decision and Penalty page, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• More detail regarding the specific disaster, declared emergency or other significant event may also be recorded
• Finalise the workflow

When a CDP participant is subject to a further reconnection requirement arising from the submission of a Provider Appointment Report (PAR), the provider is responsible for managing re-engagement requirements.

Where a CDP participant is unable to contact their provider due to a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event and has a reconnection failure period accruing pending attendance at a provider re-engagement appointment, the penalty period should be ended using the date immediately prior to the commencement of the pause to mutual obligations in the Review Decision workflow of the relevant failure.

See Finalising Community Development Program (CDP) re-engagement requirements.

Where a CDP participant with an outstanding Comprehensive Compliance Assessment (CCA) contacts and the participant lives in a region where a formal pause of mutual obligations has been advised, the CCA must be finalised without penalty. The CCA should not be conducted with the CDP participant.

• Access the CCA workflow by selecting the event date of the outstanding CCA activity from the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW)
• On the Review Record page, select Yes to the question Is the CCA valid?
• On the CCA Details page, select No to the notification question and record free text:
  'CCA finalised without penalty, not conducted with CDP participant due to a formal pause of mutual obligations approved by DEWR as a result of a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event'
• On the Customer Contact page, record:
• Incoming customer-initiated contact - other for method of contact
• Other for where the customer is calling from
• Record free text in the contact attempt section:
  'CCA finalised without penalty, not conducted with CDP participant due to a formal pause of mutual obligations approved by DEWR as a result of a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event'
• Select Yes to the question Was this contact attempt successful?
• Select No to the question Has a CCA Interview been booked?
• On the CCA Commencement page:
• Select Yes to the Privacy Notice
• Record Yes to the question Has the customer attended the CCA?
• As the CCA has not been conducted, do not make any updates on the Circumstances Impacting Compliance (CIC) page. Select continue and click OK when the pop-up presents
• On the Decision page:
• Record the outcome as: Finalise CCA and do not apply a penalty
• Reason Code: Not persistent non-compliance
• Summary of Decision text:
  'CCA finalised without penalty, not conducted with CDP participant due to a formal pause of mutual obligations approved by DEWR, as a result of a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event'
• Finalise the CCA workflow

Note: if at the time of contact the CCA has already been completed and a serious failure for persistent non-compliance has been applied, the penalty must be waived from the date the formal pause to mutual obligations was advised.

See Waiving a serious failure period.

In Process Direct:

• Go to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW) and select the relevant failure from the Outstanding Compliance Action table
• On the Investigation page, in response to the question What reason/s have they given for the failure?, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• In response to the question What is the main excuse for the failure?, select Not required - reject due to system issues
  This will automatically pre-populate the rejection reason Generated in error/unable to action on the Decision and Penalty page
• On the Decision and Penalty page, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by the DEWR'
• More detail regarding the specific disaster, declared emergency or other significant event may also be recorded

Waiver options

When the serious failure has already been applied and the CDP participant is currently serving or is due to commence a serious failure penalty period, the penalty must be waived from the date the formal pause to mutual obligations commences.

If a waiver re-engagement appointment cannot be booked within two working days due to the natural disaster/declared emergency/significant event (for example, provider closed), consideration should be given to booking a waiver re-engagement appointment at the first suitable time. If a suitable appointment is not available within 28 days, the serious failure period should be permanently waived.

See Waiving a serious failure period.

When the failure has been applied and the CDP participant advises they have been personally affected by a natural disaster/declared emergency/significant event, they may be eligible for payment under serious failure hardship provisions if:

• they indicate their willingness to attend a compliance waiver re-engagement appointment, but because of the disaster/emergency/significant event, they do not have capacity to do so, and
• serving the serious failure period would cause the CDP participant to be in severe financial hardship

See Serious failure hardship provisions.

PST-skilled staff must reject the failure without investigation where mutual obligation requirements were paused for the CDP participant's location regardless of the incident date.

In Process Direct:

• Go to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW) and select the relevant failure from the Outstanding Compliance Action table
• On the Investigation page, in response to the question What reason/s have they given for the failure?, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• In response to the question What is the main excuse for the failure?, select Not required - reject due to system issues
  This will automatically pre-populate the rejection reason Generated in error/unable to action on the Decision and Penalty page
• On the Decision and Penalty page, record 'Failure rejected due to a formal pause of mutual obligation requirements approved by DEWR'
• More detail regarding the specific disaster, declared emergency or other significant event may also be recorded
• Finalise the activity

An appropriate level of discretion should be applied when determining whether a CDP participant impacted by a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event is eligible for payment under hardship provisions during a UNPP. For example:

• When a CDP participant is unable to provide evidence or advises that they are homeless because of the disaster, emergency or other significant event, their statement should be considered appropriate evidence, unless there is reason to doubt the statement
• A CDP participant who has been impacted by a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event may be unable to provide current financial information. In these cases, the Services Australia record should be used unless disputed by the CDP participant
• When a CDP participant advises that, because of the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, they have used a significant amount of their savings and investments, this expenditure should be considered to have been unavoidable or reasonable

Unless otherwise advised for a specific situation, payment is reinstated under hardship provisions from the date the impacted CDP participant:

• asks to have the UNPP ended under hardship provisions, and
• falls within a class of person specified by the Secretary of the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations, and
• would be in severe financial hardship as a result of the UNPP

It is not appropriate to back date hardship provisions before the CDP participant meets all the above criteria.

Where a CDP participant does not meet the criteria for payment under hardship provisions, and is currently serving or yet to commence a UNPP, payment may be continued under Payment Pending Review (PPR) provisions. See Non-compliance with compulsory requirements - review and appeals.

Providers are responsible for notifying and managing reconnection requirements when a mutual obligation failure or work refusal failure has been committed and notifying Services Australia when the conditions have been met to lift a participation suspension.

Job seekers affected by a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event who have an outstanding participation suspension are required to contact their provider as soon as possible to discuss any impacts on their capacity to comply. When contact with the provider occurs, providers may decide a reconnection requirement will not be notified/needed due to the circumstances.

Note: if the job seeker is due to report but is unable to contact their provider because of impacts affecting the provider site, the job seeker should be referred to the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR) for assistance.

Generally, the Capability Assessment should be completed at the time of initial contact. Any impacts the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event are likely to have on the job seeker's capacity to meet their current requirements on an ongoing basis should be considered and recorded during the Capability Assessment.

When the job seeker is due to report and it is not possible or appropriate to complete the Capability Assessment due to the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, the PST staff may ask the job seeker to call back as soon as possible before or on their next reporting day to complete the assessment.

In these cases, the job seeker has met the re-engagement requirement to arrange a Capability Assessment once:

• the purpose of the Capability Assessment has been explained and
• privacy provisions have been read

Once this has been completed, update the Capability Assessment using Save and Exit reason Unable to complete today to allow:

• payment restoration to occur, and
• outstanding reporting to be finalised (for current report only)

For the process to Save and Exit a Capability Assessment using reason unable to complete today, see Capability Assessments.

The impact of the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event on the job seeker's capacity to comply, including capacity to make prior contact, should be considered as part of a compliance investigation.

If a job seeker was unable to comply with a requirement because of a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, their verbal statement provides the required level of evidence to make a determination of reasonable excuse. This includes the impact this may have had on the job seeker's ability to contact prior to an appointment.

When the failure event date was before the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event and the job seeker has been personally affected by the situation, consideration should be given to the impacts of applying the failure given the job seeker's current circumstances. In these cases, discretion may be used to reject the failure.

Rejecting a failure because of a disaster, declared emergency or other significant event:

• The rejection code ERB - Disastrous event or severe weather conditions - unable to comply, should be recorded. For other events, the most appropriate rejection code should be recorded (for example, PRD - Major personal crisis affected capacity to comply)
• When a decision is made to reject a failure that occurred before the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, record free text information to advise the provider the failure was rejected because the job seeker has been personally affected. Document that the short-term benefits of applying the failure would not have long-term benefits in terms of future compliance and would be considered detrimental in the circumstances

See:

• Rejecting a compliance action
• Sending free text to providers when compliance action finalised

Generally, the Unemployment Failure or Work Refusal Failure should be completed at the time of initial contact.

If an employer cannot be contacted because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, evidence provided by the job seeker along with the Employment Separation Certificate (SU1) or participation report needs to be carefully considered.

When information from the job seeker conflicts with the information recorded on an SU1, the job seeker's statement should provide enough information to make a determination on the Unemployment Failure.

Voluntary unemployment has not occurred if a job seeker left work because they are no longer being paid by their employer because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event.

When the job seeker is due to report and it is not possible or appropriate to complete the Unemployment Failure or Work Refusal Failure due to the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, Services Australia may temporarily lift the contact trigger allowing the job seeker to report:

• In the Compliance Investigation workflow, the Save and Exit option Unable to complete on day of contact must be used to record the reason the compliance investigation cannot be completed
• Exiting the workflow for this reason will return the user to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW), it will not pass through the Errors (SWE) screen and the contact trigger will be removed (for the current report only)

Note: when the job seeker is not due to report, and it is not possible or appropriate to complete the Unemployment Failure or Work Refusal Failure, the contact trigger does not need to be temporarily removed. Tell the job seeker to call back as soon as possible or on their reporting day to discuss the non-compliance.

When payment is cancelled due to persistent mutual obligation failures, an Unemployment Failure or Work Refusal Failure, a post-cancellation preclusion period prevents job seekers who reclaim from immediately returning to payment. When an Unemployment Failure occurred before claim, the new claim start date is affected by an unemployment preclusion period.

Advise the job seeker of their appeal rights. For more information, see Non-compliance with compulsory requirements - review and appeals.

If the job seeker requests assistance due to hardship, often the most appropriate action is to refer the customer to a welfare agency.

A referral for immediate social work crisis intervention may also be appropriate.

When a NAR is outstanding, Community Development Program (CDP) participants must be advised to contact their provider after all other outstanding compliance action has been finalised.

If the provider is unavailable because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, and the CDP participant's payment is suspended, PST staff can manually finalise a NAR.

See Restoring payment where a payment suspension (participation) has been imposed for Community Development Program (CDP) participants.

The assessment of outstanding failures for CDP participants who are personally affected by or are assisting with the recovery effort through a registered organisation should be given priority. This includes CDP participants who have a contact trigger or an automatic payment suspension (participation suspension (APA)).

Participation suspensions

PST-skilled staff are responsible for lifting a participation suspension (APA) for CDP participants affected by a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event once contact is established and they agree to re-engage. When PST-skilled staff determine re-engagement is not possible or appropriate, payment can be restored.

See Finalising Community Development Program (CDP) re-engagement requirements.

Failure investigations

If a CDP participant was unable to comply with a requirement because of a natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, their verbal statement provides the required level of evidence to make a determination of reasonable excuse, including the impact this may have had on the CDP participant's ability to contact prior to an appointment.

When the failure event date was before the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event and the CDP participant has been personally affected by the situation, consideration should be given to the impacts of applying the failure given their current circumstances. In these cases, discretion may be used to reject the failure.

Rejecting a failure because of a disaster, declared emergency or other significant event:

• The rejection code ERB - Disastrous event or severe weather conditions - unable to comply, should be recorded. For other events, the most appropriate rejection code should be recorded (for example, PRD - Major personal crisis affected capacity to comply)
• When a decision is made to reject a failure that occurred before the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, record free text information to advise the provider the failure was rejected because the job seeker has been personally affected. Document that the short-term benefits of applying the failure would not have long-term benefits in terms of future compliance, and would be considered detrimental in the circumstances

See:

• Rejecting a compliance action
• Sending free text to providers when compliance action finalised

When a compliance investigation, including a Comprehensive Compliance Assessment (CCA), identifies a CDP participant's capacity to comply with mutual obligation requirements has been affected by a disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, an exemption from their mutual obligation requirements should be considered.

See:

• Exempting a job seeker from mutual obligation requirements due to special circumstances, or
• Mutual obligation requirements exemptions during disasters

If an exemption has been granted for more than 14 days in the future, a no re-engagement code of RNH - No re-engagement, current exemption, should be recorded.

When a CDP participant is subject to a further reconnection requirement arising from the submission of a Provider Appointment Report (PAR), the provider is responsible for managing re-engagement requirements.

Where a CDP participant is unable to contact their provider and has a reconnection failure period accruing pending attendance at a provider re-engagement appointment, the penalty period should be ended. See Finalising Community Development Program (CDP) re-engagement requirements.

When a CDP participant is unable to comply with a further reconnection requirement due to a disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, consider if an exemption from mutual obligation requirements is appropriate.

CDP participants who contact Services Australia and advise they are affected by a disaster, declared emergency or other significant event and have an outstanding Comprehensive Compliance Assessment (CCA), should have the CCA completed by a CCA Specialist where possible.

Where the CDP participant is unable to participate in the CCA due to the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, the CCA Specialist may complete the CCA using information already available on the CDP participant's record. Interventions should include crisis intervention and non-vocational assistance to assist with disaster recovery where appropriate.

Where a CCA was unable to be completed because there is insufficient information already available on the CDP participant's record to do so, PST-skilled staff should record that the CCA was not fully undertaken due to the CDP participant being directly impacted and reject the CCA.

• Access the Comprehensive Compliance Assessment (CCA) workflow by selecting the event date of the outstanding CCA activity from the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW)
• On the Review Record page, select:
• No to the question Is the CCA valid? and
• CCA rejection reason: Nationally declared disaster
• On the Decision page, confirm:
• Incomplete comprehensive compliance assessment to the question What is the decision in relation to the compliance action? and
• Nationally declared disaster to the question What is the reason for making this decision?
• Record a summary of why the decision has been made and finalise the CCA workflow

Note: rejecting the CCA will ensure the customer is able to lodge while impacted by the significant event. Future instances of non-compliance will re-trigger a CCA.

Waiver options

When the failure has been applied and a waiver re-engagement appointment cannot be booked within 2 working days due to the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event (for example, provider closed), consideration should be given to booking a waiver re-engagement appointment at the first suitable time. If a suitable appointment is not available within 28 days, the serious failure period should be permanently waived.

See Waiving a serious failure period.

When the failure has been applied and the CDP participant advises they have been personally affected, they may be eligible for payment under serious failure hardship provisions if:

• they indicate their willingness to attend a waiver re-engagement appointment, but because of the disaster/emergency/significant event, they do not have capacity to do so, and
• serving the serious failure period would cause the CDP participant to be in severe financial hardship

See Serious failure hardship provisions.

If a CDP participant refuses to accept or fails to commence a suitable job offer due to a disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, reasonable excuse provisions will apply. The CDP participant's statement about how the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event affected their ability to accept or commence the job should provide enough information to make a determination unless there is reason to doubt their statement. When reasonable excuse is established, the serious failure should be rejected.

When the serious failure event occurred prior to the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, a serious failure will need to be investigated. However, in cases where a CDP participant has been personally affected, consideration should be given to the impacts of applying the failure given their current circumstances. In these cases, discretion may be used to reject the failure using the most appropriate rejection reason.

See Rejecting a compliance action.

Waiver options

When the failure has been applied and a waiver re-engagement appointment cannot be booked within two working days due to the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event (for example, provider closed), consideration should be given to booking a waiver re-engagement appointment at the first suitable time. If a suitable appointment is not available within 28 days, the serious failure period should be permanently waived.

See Waiving a serious failure period.

When the failure has been applied and the CDP participant advises they have been personally affected, they may be eligible for payment under serious failure hardship provisions if:

• they indicate their willingness to attend a compliance waiver re-engagement appointment, but because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, they do not have capacity to do so, and
• serving the serious failure period would cause the CDP participant to be in severe financial hardship

See Serious failure hardship provisions.

Any outstanding UNPP investigations should be investigated.

Generally, the UNPP should be completed at the time of initial contact.

If an employer cannot be contacted because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, evidence provided by the CDP participant along with the Employment Separation Certificate (SU1) or participation report needs to be considered.

When information from the CDP participant conflicts with the information recorded on the SU1, the CDP participant's statement should provide enough information to make a determination on the UNPP.

Voluntary unemployment has not occurred if a CDP participant left work because they are no longer being paid by their employer because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event.

When the CDP participant is due to report and it is not possible or appropriate to complete the UNPP due to the natural disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, Services Australia may temporarily lift the contact trigger allowing the CDP participant to report:

• In the Compliance Investigation workflow, the Save and Exit option Unable to complete on day of contact must be used to record the reason the compliance investigation cannot be completed
• Exiting the workflow for this reason will return the user to the Participation Compliance Hub (BIPCW), it will not pass through the Errors (SWE) screen and the contact trigger will be removed (for current report only)

When a decision is made to apply a UNPP, the CDP participant's eligibility to have the UNPP ended under the hardship provisions should be assessed.

An appropriate level of discretion should be applied when determining whether a CDP participant is eligible for payment under hardship provisions during a UNPP and has been impacted by a disaster or declared emergency. For example, when a CDP participant:

• is unable to provide evidence or advises that they are homeless because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, their statement should be considered appropriate evidence, unless there is reason to doubt the statement
• may be unable to provide current financial information, the Services Australia record should be used unless disputed by the CDP participant
• advises that, because of the disaster, declared emergency or other significant event, they have used a significant amount of their savings and investments, this expenditure should be considered to have been unavoidable or reasonable

Unless otherwise advised for a specific situation, payment is reinstated under hardship provisions from the date the impacted CDP participant:

• asks to have the UNPP ended under hardship provisions, and
• falls within a class of person specified by the Secretary of DEWR, and
• would be in severe financial hardship because of the UNPP

It is not appropriate to back date hardship provisions before the CDP participant meets all the above criteria. See Unemployment due to a voluntary act or misconduct.

Where a CDP participant does not meet the criteria for payment under hardship provisions, and is currently serving or yet to commence a UNPP, payment may be continued under Payment Pending Review (PPR) provisions.

See Non-compliance with compulsory requirements - review and appeals.