Generating participation failures for Youth Allowance and Austudy students 010-07020020

A Youth Allowance activity agreement for a student details the steps they undertake in order to comply with their full-time study requirements.

This procedure does not apply to:

• ABSTUDY customers who are assessed under a specific breach framework
• Australian Apprentices receiving YA or Austudy because they are exempt from the full-time study requirements at all times
• part-time apprentices who are doing a course which does not qualify them for payment as a full-time student or an Australian Apprentice. These part-time apprentices are regarded as job seekers and are required to comply with activities negotiated in a Job/Participation Plan

One of the qualifications for both Austudy and YA is that the student must satisfy the full-time study requirements unless they are exempt.

Austudy students must be undertaking qualifying study to meet undertaking full time study requirements.

YA students must be undertaking full-time study or an approved concessional study load and, if at school, meet attendance requirements to meet the full-time study requirements.

All Austudy and YA students are required to attend compulsory participation appointments with Services Australia (for example,’ participation related Service Profiling appointments).

Where a YA or Austudy student fails to satisfy the full-time study requirements, qualification for the payment may be lost and a debt potentially raised for the period of time the customer was paid but not qualified.

A participation failure may be incurred by an Austudy or YA student in certain circumstances where the student has:

• not met their full-time study requirements, including agreed requirements set out in a Youth Allowance activity agreement
• failed to attend a required participation related appointment (for example, a participation related Service Profile appointment)

If a student has had three or more failures in a period of 12 months, an 8 week non-payment period may be considered. See Determining whether a participation failure is applicable for students.

Service Officers gather facts and evidence in relation to the failure to meet the full-time study requirements then decide if the payment should be cancelled because the customer is no longer qualified, or generate a potential participation failure.

If a participation failure is generated, staff in the Participation Solutions Team (PST) will then determine the validity of the potential failure, apply or reject the failure and contact the customer to rebook appointments if required.

When making an unfavourable decision, speak to the customer:

• explain the decision
• give them a chance to provide more information, and
• advise their review and appeal rights

Make 2 genuine attempts to contact the customer before finalising the decision.