Historic child support assessments

During our investigation of a complaint made to the Office in 2018, we became aware that a problem with child support IT systems had resulted in inaccurate child support assessments.

While the individual complaint was resolved, the investigation identified a systemic issue affecting approximately 33,000 individuals and 47,000 customer incomes used for child support assessments.

We continued to engage with Services Australia on the issue, and in 2019 Services Australia advised it would re-assess and remediate all affected cases it had identified.

In July 2021, however, Services Australia advised it intended to only remediate cases that were either active or finalised with arrears (Error Correction Cases), and it would not re-visit any of the cases finalised without arrears (Remaining Cases).

We were not sure this was fair, so we sought more information from Services Australia to help us determine the extent of the issue and the action taken to remediate affected cases.

As a result of this work, the Ombudsman published Making things right: insights into Services Australia’s handling of the impact of a system error on certain historic child support assessments in August 2023.

This statement included 4 suggestions to improve Services Australia’s approach to remediating the effects of the system error.

Services Australia accepted our suggestions that they should obtain more data on the impact on affected people, get external legal advice and contact affected people.

Eighty per cent of affected customers have since been notified, and Services Australia is on track to complete notification by early 2024–25.

2024