Kind Of Work - Application of the Work History Test for Veterans Under Age 65

1. The Work History Test focuses on the reasons for the veteran being prevented from continuing to undertake the remunerative work that they were undertaking with reference to their normal remunerative work and any other type of work they may have undertaken in their employment history.  Capacity to update skills or retrain may be relevant. This will have been considered in part under the Work Capacity Test. Failure to maintain skill levels may, however, reflect an innate inability to do so. Evidence would need to be carefully evaluated.

2. Delegates must consider whether during the assessment period, a veteran is still undertaking the type of work he or she was previously undertaking, but on a materially restricted basis (for example, from full-time to part-time or intermittent, or part-time to limited irregular hours) because of their accepted conditions alone and suffered a resultant loss of salary or wages.

3. In addition, the veteran's entire work history and the range of work undertaken will need to be examined in order for this Test to be properly considered. This may include an analysis of the work the veteran was undertaking prior to their service, as well as during and after their service. This is a necessary step to identify if the remunerative work that the veteran has been prevented from continuing may be a type of work they were undertaking prior to their enlistment.

4. Some veterans may have a very wide range of work, whereas others may have a very narrow and specific range of work, even to the point where they have only ever had one type of employment other than their service (or that may be only their Defence Force employment).

For example, a veteran who has held many jobs over their working life as a gardener, bricklayer, handyman etc could be given the general classification of 'labourer'. Whereas a veteran who has only ever worked as an accountant could be given the specific classification of 'accounting'. These classifications and the nature of that type of work can then be used in assessing what impacts the veteran's accepted condition/s have on that work.