Action on child care payment delays

All families will receive their full entitlements within two weeks of July 1 under the new Child Care Benefit, despite a child care service assessment notice problem, Minister for Community Services Larry Anthony said today.

Mr Anthony acknowledged there was a problem implementing changes to the childcare fee relief system and reassured families that they will receive their full entitlements back-dated to July 1.

“Extra information is being provided to help services estimate the fee reduction to apply from July 1, and fee reductions will be backdated to July 1,” said Mr Anthony.

“Most families using Commonwealth-funded childcare have received notices of their correct entitlements from the new Family Assistance Office. If these notices are provided to their child care service, the fee reduction for that family can be calculated.

“The Family Assistance Office, which undertakes the assessments, expects to replace incorrect or incomplete assessment notices as soon as possible.

“Most families do not need to do anything extra.

“I ask that families be patient with services unable to offer the higher fee reductions immediately because of the processing delays.

“This is an unfortunate, one-off delay,” said Mr Anthony.