C02/2006 Centrelink Clearances

External

Departmental Instruction

DATE OF ISSUE: 17 February 2006

Centrelink Clearances

Purpose

The purpose of the departmental instruction is to:

advise of the introduction of on-line facilities for requesting Centrelink clearance reports and
provide information on an additional manual clearance form being used by Centrelink for clearances for deceased or separated clients.

Background

The implementation of the Defence Force Income Support Allowance (DFISA) in September 2004 allowed the partial automation of the clearance process between DVA and Centrelink.

Further automation of the clearance process occurred in December 2004, and in June 2005 the facility to enable on-line tracking of the clearance process at a client level, was implemented.

Online Clearance Reports

On-line clearance reports

The implementation of the on-line clearance report facility will enable staff in State Offices to request reports based on the various stages of the clearance process.

The purpose of the reports is to improve client outcomes through closer monitoring of the clearance process. The reports can be viewed on-line immediately, then printed or using existing VIEW functionality exported to Excel or Word. This means that staff will have the ability to quickly identify any cases where arrears are still being held.

Types of Clearance Reports

Staff in State Offices will be able to request three different types of reports:

Outstanding clearance data

These are clearances that are awaiting the return of clearance data from Centrelink.

Outstanding manual action

This report identifies clearances where the clearance data has been returned from Centrelink, but there is some manual action required by staff to complete the clearance process e.g. offsetting of DVA debt from arrears.

Finalised clearances

This report will list all clearances that have been finalised within a certain date range.

Requesting Reports

Reports can be requested using the Request Reports facility from the Action menu in VIEW, as per the figure below.

A detailed description of the procedure for requesting the various reports can be found in the attached document, Attachment A.

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Online Clearance Reports, Continued

Format of reports

The reports may be:

Viewed on-line
Printed using the VIEW print facility
Exported to Word or Excel.

The process for requesting and exporting the Clearance Reports is the same as for other reports available through the VIEW report requesting facility.

Implementation date

The 'Clearance Report' facility will be available from 15 February 2006.

Outstanding clearance data

These reports will list any clearances which are awaiting the return of clearance data from Centrelink. Staff will be able to request the reports based on the following selections:

State or all states

Single stage or all stages within a specified range

The report will contain the following information:

File number

Name

Centrelink CRN

Date clearance created

Type of clearance (DP/SP/ISS/AP/WWP)

Amount of arrears held for each clearance

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Online Clearance Reports, Continued

Outstanding manual action reports

The information contained in these reports details those cases where all the clearance data has been returned from Centrelink, but there remains manual action by staff in the State Office to complete the clearance process.

Manual action will be necessary in certain circumstances such as where arrears have been held due to the client having a DVA debt or where the veteran or their partner has recently passed away.

Staff will be able to select these reports by:

State or all states

Single stage or all stages applicable to manual action

The report will contain:

File number

Name

Centrelink CRN

Date clearance created

Type of clearance (SP/DP/ISS/AP/WWP)

Amount of arrears held for each clearance

Outstanding clearances over 42 days

If a clearance is still outstanding after 42 days and ALL arrears have been released, the clearance will be finalised automatically by a daily scheduled batch process. If arrears are still being held for the clearance action, then the clearance will not be automatically finalised.

Continued on next page

Online Clearance Reports, Continued

Finalised Clearance reports

This report lists all clearance actions that have been finalised within a certain date range (limited to a 3 month period).

Staff will be able to select these reports by:

State or all states

Specified date range

The report will contain the following information:

File number

Name

Centrelink CRN

Date clearance created

Date clearance finalised

Type of clearance (SP/DP/ISS/AP/WWP)

Amount of arrears created for each clearance

Amount sent to Centrelink overpayment recovery.

The report will also contain a Summary which includes the following:

Number finalised in < 5 days

Total amount of arrears created

Total amount sent to Centrelink overpayment recovery.

Procedural Guide

A guide to using the on-line clearance report facility can be found in the attached documentation, Attachment A.

New manual Centrelink clearance form for deceased and separated clients

Overview

In some instances Centrelink are unable to automatically transmit DFISA rates to DVA to enable payment to the client. This is usually where the client is either deceased or has separated from their partner, and the client is owed DFISA for the period they were alive or with the partner.

Use of the form

The new form will only be used in the following circumstances:

Cases where one member of a couple is deceased and there is a backdated grant of DVA DP which results in an adjustment to a Centrelink income support payment and payment of DFISA for the period when that deceased person was alive.
Cases where the spouse is now separated from the veteran but is entitled to DFISA for a previous period when DVA DP jointly impacted the income support assessment.
Cases where the spouse's income support payment now cancelled at Centrelink, but due to backdated DP grant to the veteran is entitled to a DFISA payment for the previous period.

Information provided by Centrelink

Centrelink and DVA have agreed on a new manual clearance form for use in circumstances where the client is either deceased or has separated from their partner.

Date of introduction

Centrelink have advised that they are to commence using this form immediately.

Purpose and design of the new form

The new form has been developed to facilitate the payment of DFISA to the above clients. The form is very similar to the current manual clearance form but contains additional fields to provide DFISA payment information.

Action Required

Adjustments

The clearance is to be processed in the same manner as other clearances that are received by the State Offices.

DFISA Rate

The DFISA rate portion of the clearance lists the DFISA entitlements that are due to the client, but cannot be paid automatically through the nightly DFISA transmission process.

This DFISA entitlement is owed to the client. This DFISA entitlement may be paid to the client using a Manual IPS assessment created through VIEW.

**NOTE: Amounts listed in the RATE column are per day. Simply multiply by 14 to get a fortnightly rate.**

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New manual Centrelink clearance form for deceased and separated clients, Continued

Example

The example below shows how the information provided on the clearance form should be entered into an IPS Manual Assessment.

[1] Information received from Centrelink on Clearance form.

DFISA Type	P — er day	Date of Death/Sep	Period
DFISA NSA	$2.4156	11/2/2006	20/9/2005	to	1/1/2006
DFISA NSA	$2.8416	11/2/2006	1/1/2006	to	11/2/2006

[2] Create Manual IPS assessment thusly:

Assessment Seq Number....DFISA1 (or alternative)

Held Arrears..............No

Clearance Indicator.........No

Assessment Source........VIEW/IPS Online

Assessment Comments......Payment of outstanding DFISA NSA entitlement per Centrelink Clearance.

Payability 1

Payability................DFISA Newstart

Level...................Variable Rate

Amount.................$33.82 (daily rate multiplied by 14)

Date of Effect.............20/09/2005

Expected Payment Date.....16/03/2006 (Current Pension Payday)

End Date................01/01/2006

Old Level................Nil

Old Amount..............$0.00

Entitlement Code..........Australian - Serving Member

Payability 2

Payability................DFISA Newstart

Level...................Variable Rate

Amount.................$39.78 (daily rate multiplied by 14)

Date of Effect.............01/01/2006

Payability Status...........To Be Released

Expected Payment Date.....16/03/2006 (Current Pension Payday)

End Date................11/02/2006

Old Level................Nil

Old Amount..............$0.00

Entitlement Code..........Australian - Serving Member

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New manual Centrelink clearance form for deceased and separated clients, Continued

Example of new Clearance form

An example of the new Centrelink clearance form can be found at Attachment B

Contact details

For any enquiries regarding this Stateline please contact:

Diane Gilbert, Project Officer, New systems Development either by email or by phone on 27431; or

Andrew Eime, Assistant Director, New Systems Development either via email or by phone on 50226.

Any management issues should be directed to Ron Mildenhall, Director, New Systems Development on 68286.

Jeanette Ricketts

Branch Head

Income Support

17 February 2006

ATTACHMENT A

Clearance Reports – Procedural Guidelines

HOW TO REQUEST A REPORT

Step 1

Click on the Action \menu in VIEW and select Request Reports

Step 2

Select the Centrelink Clearance Reports Tab

Step 3

Open Predefined Reports folder and select the type of report to be produced.

The options are:

Clearances - Finalised
Clearances – Outstanding Data
Clearances - Outstanding Manual Action

Step 4

Open the Report Parameters folder and select the following details from the drop boxes:

State
An individual clearance stage or All Stages

****NOTE: Only stages applicable to the report type selected will be displayed.****

Step 5

Use the Batch Priority menu to indicate whether the report should be produced immediately, overnight or on the same day.

Step 6

To submit the report click on the Results/Batch folder. This will initiate the request for the report and also provide details of the reference number for identification purposes.

****NOTE: If another person has requested an identical report, a message will be displayed to indicate that the report has already been produced. You can then access and download this report. If you wish to request a particular report on a frequent basis, you will need to delete the prior request before requesting the new report.****

Step 7

To view the results of your request or check on the status of the request, open the Display Batch Results folder. This will display the status of your report – i.e. whether it has been completed or not. If the status is 'Complete – Results available' the report has been finalised and is available for viewing or printing, or alternatively exporting to Excel or Word.

Step 8

To display the results of the report, select the REF# for your report from the drop down box and click on the Results folder.

The report will be displayed in the following format with the oldest case listed first.

(In this instance the personal details of these clients have been concealed for privacy purposes).

Step 9

The report can now be exported to Excel or Word in the same manner as the other types of online reports.

Continued on next page

Clearance stages

Description of stages

For an updated description of the various stages that a clearance may pass through please refer to the table below.

Stage	Description
No tracking Stage Recorded	Clearance was processed prior to the commencement of online tracking
Pending – Awaiting Transmission	PIPS/CCPS case has been authorized but transmission of the clearance will not occur until 4am the next morning.
Not sent – client not matched	Only personal details have been sent to Centrelink to initiate a possible match. Details of grant/increase have not been sent at this time
Not Sent – No match received and arrears released	Personal details have been sent to Centrelink, who have advised that there is no match on the client and therefore arrears released.
Not Sent – no match received and arrears held due to DVA debt	Personal details have been sent to Centrelink, who have advised that there is no match on the client and therefore arrears released. However, arrears have not been released due to a debt being recorded in DMRS.
Sent – Awaiting Reply	Centrelink have recorded a match for the client. DVA are waiting the return from Centrelink of any adjustment.
Manual Arrears processed via VIEW	The State Office has released the arrears manually.
Returned – Arrears held as partial clearance received	Occurs when there are 2 clearances in progress such as with a grant of WWP & ISS. A response has been received from Centrelink for one payment type but not the other.
Returned – Arrears held due DVA debt	DVA have received a response from Centrelink but the arrears continue to be held as the client has a debt recorded in DMRS. At this stage any Centrelink adjustment has already been deducted from the available arrears.
Returned – Client is deceased – manual clearance is required	Client is deceased, therefore the clearance needs to be processed manually
Returned – Partner is deceased – manual clearance required	This applies to DP clearances where the partner is deceased. It is for information purposes only
Returned – all arrears released	All information returned from Centrelink and all arrears have been released
Returned – no arrears were held for this clearance	All information returned from Centrelink. No arrears were held.
Returned – no match received and no arrears held	Client has not been matched at Centrelink and there are no arrears held.
Finalised – clearance completed	This stage will be displayed when all arrears have been released and all action relating to the clearance has been finalised.

ATTACHMENT B

Centrelink clearance form for deceased and separated clients.

	*DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS' AFFAIRS* *REQUEST FOR CENTRELINK CLEARANCE*
	To be retained by Centrelink

Centrelink Clearance Office		DVA Reference No
Centrelink Fax No		DVA Assessment No
Centrelink Reference No		DVA Fax No

PART A: (Completed by DVA)

1. APPLICANT'S DETAILS

Surname — Given Name(s)Date of Birth

Name of Client
Name of Partner
Maiden Name/AKA
Address

2. The client and/or partner will be or has/ve been granted/increased

	type of entitlement								with effect from
Client :	■SP	■ AP	■ ISS	■ WWP	■ OP	■ DP	■PA	■ CSHC
Rate p/f	$	$	$	$	$	$	$

Partner:		■SP	■ AP	■ ISS	■ WWP	■ OP	■ DP	■PA	■ CSHC
	Rate p/f	$	$	$	$	$	$	$

KEY: SP = service pension; AP = age pension; ISS = income support supplement; WWP = war widow's /war widower's pension; OP = orphan's pension; DP = disability pension; PA = pharmaceutical allowance; CSHC = Commonwealth Senior's Health Card;

3. Complete if granted benefit has varied in rate throughout the period

Type	*Old % rate*	*New % rate*	*Old $*	*New $*	*Date of effect*

KEY:DP = disability pension; DP & LIM = disability pension with limitation ie. the DP amount is limited due to payment of other compensation; the actual (net) amount of DP received is shown

4. Complete if client or partner has been granted WWP

Date of death

Please Note: WWP is treated as income for Social Security pensions such as age, disability support, wife and carer until 20 March 1995. From 20 March 1995 the TOTAL amount of Social Security pension is cancelled. Other benefits such as sole parent pension, job search allowance, new start allowance, sickness allowance and or special benefit are not payable from date of grant of WWP.

for Deputy Commissioner	Date

DVA Contact Officer:		Phone Number:

	*CENTRELINK* *CLEARANCE*
Manual Clearance for Deceased or Separated customers, incl. DFISA Adjustments

Centrelink Clearance Office		DVA Reference No
Centrelink Fax No		DVA Assessment No
Centrelink Reference No		DVA Fax No

Warning: The attached information is strictly confidential. If you receive this fax and you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by telephone. This information is covered by Section 1312B of the Social Security Act 1991 and is protected information. If you further disclose, record, or otherwise use this information, you will be committing a criminal offence and are liable to criminal prosecution, attracting a penalty of 2 years jail, a fine of $12,000, or both. The authority to seek this information is contained in Section 128 of the Veterans' Entitlements Act 1986.

PART B: (Completed by Centrelink)

CENTRELINK ADJUSTMENT

Surname — Given Name(s)Centrelink Reference No

Name of Client
Name of Partner

PARTNER ADDRESS	PARTNER DOB	ACCOUNT NAME / BSB / ACCT NO.

Pension or benefit from Centrelink will be cancelled/varied on the date indicated
Please recover the amount shown below – a recoverable debt under s. 1223(1) of the SSA
Centrelink payment record – no adjustment necessary
No Centrelink payment record found

1.Client

Cancelled / Varied

Rate p/f

Payment Type/s

Adjustment period

Adjustment amount

from

DFISA Type

P — er day

Date of Death/Sep

Period

2.Partner

Cancelled / Varied

Rate p/f

Payment Type/s

Adjustment period

Adjustment amount

from

DFISA Type

P — er day

Date of Death/Sep

Period

Delegate of the Secretary

Date

Centrelink Contact Officer:

Phone Number:

Area Office:

Fax Number:

Please ensure all clearances are signed, as we are unable to release any arrears based on an unsigned clearance, necessitating the return of the form for completion.

PART C: (Completed by DVA)

Attn Centrelink Contact Officer:

Adjustment amount of

for

was recovered on

outstanding balance of

is referred back to Centrelink

Adjustment amount of

for

was recovered on

outstanding balance of

is referred back to Centrelink

for Deputy Commissioner	Date
DVA Contact Officer:		Phone Number: