Transfer of information between Centrelink and Child Support 277-51130110

Co-located sites - in person

Information can be sought directly, providing the information request conforms to the disclosure protocol.

All other staff

For non-urgent day-to-day enquiries, the following staff are authorised to send a Fast Note to the Child Support Unit (CSU) who will access the information via Cuba and respond or escalate the request to Child Support.

• Smart Centre staff (including Medicare)
• Authorised Review Officers (AROs) - AROs are permitted to call the Child Support Unit as these cases are deemed urgent

The Fast Note must include the nature of the enquiry and the information that is required from Child Support. For data exchange issues relating to:

• Maintenance Action or Maintenance Income, create a Fast Note - select Auto Text, use Families > Enquiry > Maintenance Enquiry. For urgent enquiries include the keyword 'URGENT'
• Alignment of Care, create a Fast Note - select Auto Text, use Families > Enquiry > Alignment of Care. For urgent enquiries include the keyword 'URGENT'

Urgent matters - phone

For matters relating to a customer escalation or of a complex nature, which requires verbal discussion to resolve and are, deemed urgent.

It is considered urgent if the information is required in less than 3 working days, which is the normal timeframe for responses under national protocols.

The following staff are authorised to call the Child Support Unit to verify child support data:

• Appropriately trained Smart Centre staff (including Medicare)
• AROs

Note: a Fast Note is still required when contact by phone is required. For urgent enquiries, include the keyword 'URGENT'.

The Child Support Unit is authorised to contact Child Support in complex matters or where escalation requires immediate response before 5 working days.

For contact information, see Child Support or search Child Support Unit in Office Locator.

Customer Liaison Unit (CLU) staff from Child Support are authorised to contact:

• CSU for normal day to day requests. For contact details, see Child Support for the email address. Note: the Child Support CLU will only email the CSU team mailboxes if responding to an enquiry generated from the CSU team mailbox
• Families and Child Care Processing Services for Alignment of Care - FAO in tray, day to day requests. For contact details, see Child Support for the CSU email address

Urgent matters - phone

For matters relating to a customer escalation or of a complex nature which requires verbal discussion to resolve.

It is considered urgent if the information is required in less than 5 working days, which is the normal timeframe for responses under national protocols.

Only Child Support CLU staff are authorised to contact Centrelink (generally the Child Support CLU will contact the CSU via phone), with exceptions for the following Child Support staff:

• Complaints Resolution Team officers
• External Complaints – Child Support Officers (previously Customer Service or Ministerial Ombudsman Officers)
• Program Support Managers
• Deceased Customer Management (DCM) team
• Personalised Services Team
• Data integrity Team - contact with CSU QLD
• Objections Officers

Staff will contact the CSU responsible for the state in which the customer resides.

For contact details, see Child Support for the relevant phone number.

To allow for the correct application of the Maintenance Action Test (MAT) and Maintenance Income Test (MIT) for Family Tax Benefit (FTB) customers, Child Support transfers child support entitlement data via a weekly Entitlement load for mutual customers.

For FTB customers who are Child Support collect, Child Support also transfers a Disbursement load 3 times per month.

From 1 July 2010, or 3 March 2011 for WA Ex-Nuptial cases, care arrangements for a mutual customer determined by Child Support will be transferred to Centrelink for FTB entitlement to be assessed.

A mutual customer matching and validation process occurs to ensure the data is loaded onto the correct customer's record. Matching is done at the paying parent, receiving parent and child level.

If current information about child support entitlement is not displayed on the customer's record, it could be due to a mismatch. See mutual customer matching.

If there is no mismatch and the data is not on the customer's record, the Service Officer should wait a week to see if the next load fixes the problem. If it is suspected that the latest child support data has not been loaded on the customer's record, process a refresh activity.

CSU staff can use the CSA Data Refresh (MNRF) screen to request the following information from Child Support from a specified date:

• Entitlement data 'ENT'
• Disbursement data 'DIS'
• Care data 'CAR'
• Education data 'EDU'

Note: disbursement information prior to 1 July 2002 cannot be requested. If earlier information is needed, the CSU can use the Maintenance Override (MNOI) screen to manually correct the record for reconciliation purposes.

Requesting historical data

If Child Support has retrospectively amended entitlement/ disbursement details, requesting a refresh for a past period may overwrite existing child support information, which could affect child support action, can impact ongoing FTB entitlement, continuous adjustment calculations and reconciliation, and may result in a debt / arrears. Previous workarounds, and manual overrides coded on MNOI screen, may have adverse effects.

Create a Fast Note - select Auto Text, use Families > Enquiry > Maintenance Enquiry.

CSU staff only

See Child Support data has not loaded onto customer's record.

A weekly child support entitlement load is transmitted electronically from Child Support to Centrelink each Saturday. The information is loaded on to the Centrelink system by the following Monday.

Child Support transfers details of all entitlement changes made since the last Child Support extract date (for example, after reviewing a previous child support assessment), advising the start date and end date of each separate assessment.

Child Support data can impact ongoing FTB entitlement, continuous adjustment calculations and reconciliation and may result in a debt/ arrears. Previous workarounds, and manual overrides coded on Maintenance Override (MNOI) screen, may have adverse effects.

Entitlement data can update the maintenance action code for a child. This may result in FTB being reduced to the base rate for the child, depending on the reason. See Maintenance Action Test (MAT) codes.

If a case or child end is received from Child Support, a Manual Follow-up (MFU) activity will be created so the details can be checked. If the data is confirmed as incorrect, the customer's record will need to be corrected. See Child support Manual Follow-up (MFU) activities and automatic reviews.

View child support entitlement data

• for the current financial year on the Maintenance - Group Annual Entitlement (MNGE) and Maintenance - Child Annual Entitlement (MNCE) screens
• for previous financial year Retrospective Child Support assessments and Family Tax Benefit on the CSA Assessments (MNGR) screen

Entitlement details include:

• Child Support Case details: case ID, case status, status date and status reason
• Stage
• Entitlement details for Child Support case: daily amount, status, status date and status reason
• Collection method details: type, status, status date and status reason
• Receiving parent details including: Customer Reference Number (CRN), Child Support ID, name and date of birth
• Paying parent details including CRN, Child Support ID, name and date of birth
• Number of children in case
• Child details including CRN, Child Support ID, name, date of birth, Child Support status/ status date/ status reason, care percentage, care type, Stage, entitlement amount for child, collection method

Maintenance income is affected when entitlement details are transferred from Child Support.

For details of date of effect of changes and maintenance income assessment, see Working out annual maintenance income.

For the effect on FTB of a backdated child support assessment, see Retrospective child support assessments.

Details of child support disbursements (payments made by Child Support to Child Support collect customers) are sent from Child Support 3 times per month:

• the first load is sent on the weekend before the third Wednesday of the month
• the second and third loads are sent the following weekends

Disbursement loads have no effect on Family Tax Benefit (FTB) if maintenance income is assessed using the entitlement method unless the disbursement calculation is greater than the entitlement calculation. See Modified Entitlement Method.

Child Support also transfers details of any changes to previously advised disbursement details that have been made since the last Child Support extract date. Changes include:

• changes to payment dates or amounts
• returned, rejected, stopped or stale payments
• reissued payments
• changes to payment dates or amounts of Non-agency payments

Existing data on the customer's record will be adjusted to show the previous and new payment details so Service Officers can work out the previous impact on FTB. This historical data can impact ongoing FTB entitlement, Continuous Adjustment calculations, and reconciliation and may result in a debt/ arrears. Previous workarounds, and manual overrides coded on MNOI screen, may have adverse effects.

Disbursement details include:

• Child Support Case ID
• paying parent Customer Reference Number (CRN) and Child Support ID
• number of payments
• for each payment: payment type (regular, emergency or Non-agency payment), date and amount

View disbursement information for an entitlement group on the Mtce: Child Support disbursed payments - Group (MNGP) screen.

For details of date of effect and assessment of maintenance income, see Modified Entitlement Method - Working out annual maintenance income.

For more information, see Child Support collection for Centrelink staff.

To allow for the administration of Child Support Law governing registration, assessment and collection of child support, Centrelink passes information to Child Support electronically via a daily file.

For customers matched via the mutual customer matching process, Centrelink passes the following information in the daily file whenever there is a change in that information:

• eligibility for Family Tax Benefit (FTB) Part A
• child shared care percentage
• pension/benefit status
• pension/benefit amounts (as they appear on the customer's Centrelink payment summary)
• office code
• relationship status
• financial institution, and
• information relating to deductions to collect child support from pension, benefit, ABSTUDY or FTB of a child support paying parent

Centrelink payment summary details for the financial year that has just ended are transferred to Child Support. This usually occurs in mid-July once the calculations and printing has been finalised within Centrelink. Amended Centrelink payment summary details for that financial year only are transferred to Child Support on a daily basis.

A Centrelink payment summary transferred to Child Support may display the following pension/benefit types:

• ABSTUDY
• ABSTUDY PES
• Age (Blind)
• Age Pension
• Austudy
• Carer Payment Age
• CDEP Supplement (JobSeeker Payment)
• CDEP Supplement (Pension)
• CDEP Supplement (Parenting)
• Climate Change Adjustment Program Re-establishment Grant
• Disability Support Pension
• Exceptional Circumstances Relief Payment
• Education Entry Payment (JobSeeker Payment)
• Education Entry Payment (Pension)
• Education Entry Payment (Parenting)
• Emergency & General Assistance Payment
• Emergency Recovery Payment
• Farm Exit Support Grant
• Farm Family Support
• Interim Farm Household Allowance
• JobSeeker Payment (JSP)
• Language, Literacy and Numeracy
• Mature Age Allowance
• Parental Leave Pay
• Parenting Payment Partnered
• Parenting Payment Single
• SPL - Special Benefit
• Transitional Farm Family Payment
• Youth Allowance
• Youth Allowance Apprentice/Trainee
• Youth Allowance Job Seeker
• Youth Allowance Student
• Youth Training DETYA Appropriation

For more information about Centrelink payment summaries, see Issuing Payment Summaries.

From 1 July 2010, or 3 March 2011 for WA Ex-Nuptial cases, care arrangements for a mutual customer determined at either program will be transferred and used in the assessment of family assistance and child support entitlements.

Daily transfers between Centrelink and Child Support will update the FTB Shared Care (FSC) and the Care Alignment Details screens for the relevant child with current information.

This process will allow mutual customers to only lodge care arrangements once for both Centrelink and child support payments to be assessed. Any care arrangements prior to 1 July 2010, or 3 March 2011 for WA Ex-Nuptial cases, will be processed by each program as per previous arrangements and will not be displayed on the relevant child's Care Alignment Details screen.

If:

• a customer contacts the Services Australia about an issue concerning the Child Support data exchange, or
• staff identify any potential issues with the data exchange, including issues relating to review of care decisions

Create a Fast Note - select Auto Text, use Families > Enquiry > Alignment of Care. For urgent enquiries, also include the keyword 'URGENT'.

The Fast Note must include the nature of the enquiry and the information that is required from Child Support.

Known issue

If the step parent is claiming FTB and is partnered to a natural/biological parent an issue may arise with the data exchange from Child Support to Centrelink. In these cases the care arrangements are being updated by Child Support in relation to the natural/biological parent, however because the step parent is claiming FTB, the data exchange will not transfer the care information.

This is because the biological parent is not recognised as a mutual customer, that is, they are not in receipt of FTB. Where a customer contacts Centrelink to advise that the care change has already been actioned by Child Support, Centrelink must confirm care details directly with Child Support as per above.

Once this has been confirmed the step parent coding will need to be checked in accordance with the procedure Customer advises care arrangements for Family Tax Benefit (FTB). Step parent cases may also need to be sent to the ICT helpdesk.

Data exchange system issues must be referred by a Service Support Officer (SSO) to the National ICT Referral Process, and not directly to the ICT service desk. The Resources page contains a link to more information.

MFUs are created for Families and Child Care Processing Services (FCC)/ Child Support Unit (CSU) staff to process where further action is required as a result of information transferred between Child Support and Centrelink for mutual customers.

See:

• Matching a child support child between Centrelink and child support
• Child support Manual Follow-up (MFU) activities and automatic reviews
• Alignment of Care Manual Follow-up (MFU) activities

Child Support intray emails are requests from Child Support to Centrelink via the general CSU mailbox for data on a Centrelink record regarding care assessments or child support details for children of mutual customers. These requests are complex or require an update to the ISIS system.

See Recovering a Child Support debt from a Family Tax Benefit (FTB) (dept local)

When information has been requested via S120, record details on a DOC. Use Fast Note, select Auto Text use Families > updates > CSP info request S120.