Changing your child support assessment in special circumstances
If you believe your child support assessment doesn’t reflect your, your children’s or
the other parent’s special circumstances, you may be able to apply for a change of assessment.
To apply for a change to your child support assessment, your circumstances must fall within
one of a number of reasons to seek a change. Just being unhappy with your assessment is not a
reason to apply for a change of assessment.
There are 10 reasons for changing the assessment:
-
The costs of maintaining a child are significantly affected by high costs of enabling
a parent to spend time with, or communicate with, the child.
-
The costs of maintaining a child are significantly affected by high costs associated
with the child’s special needs.
-
The costs of maintaining a child are significantly affected by high costs of caring for,
educating or training the child in the way both parents intended.
-
The child support assessment is unfair because of the child’s income, earning capacity,
property or financial resources.
-
The child support assessment is unfair because the paying parent has paid or transferred money,
goods or property to the child, the receiving parent, or a third party for the benefit of the child.
-
The costs of maintaining a child are significantly affected by the parent or non-parent
carer’s high child care costs for the child (and the child is under 12 years).
-
The parent’s necessary expenses significantly affect their capacity to support the child.
-
The child support assessment is unfair because of the income, earning capacity, property
or financial resources of one or both parents.
- The parent’s capacity to support the child is significantly affected by:
- their legal duty to maintain another child or person,
- their necessary expenses in supporting another child or person they have a legal duty to maintain
-
their high costs of enabling them to spend time with, or communicate with, another child
or person they have a legal duty to maintain.
-
The parent’s responsibility to maintain a resident child significantly reduces their
capacity to support the child support child
Applying for a change of assessment is a formal process. You need to apply using a form,
explain the reasons why your assessment should be changed, and provide information to
support your application
Call us on 131 272 before you apply for a change of assessment.
Sometimes a simple option is available.
The change of assessment process can take up to three months to complete and involves
sharing a lot of information with the other parent. CSA will arrange a conference
with you and the other parent, either in person or over the telephone. CSA can arrange
separate conferences if you don’t want a joint conference.
More information is available in The Guide.