Child support

All child support payments from a private arrangement and Inland Revenue are counted as income. If you get Unsupported Child's Benefit, there are different rules for how we treat child support as income.

Child support through a private arrangement

You need to tell us about any child support payments you get through a private arrangement. This includes any child support you get from an overseas agency.

The easiest way to do this is online, using MyMSD.

See instructions on this page under 'How to tell us about child support using MyMSD'.

Child support through Inland Revenue

If you get child support through Inland Revenue (IR), they share your child support payment information with us. They do this under our Approved Information Sharing Agreement.

This means you don't need to tell us about most types of IR child support payments.

Information sharing with MSD - IR website

IR child support you still need to tell us about

There are some types of IR child support payments you still need to tell us about. 

This includes child support you get:

  • through IR that relates to a period before 1 July 2023
  • for a child you get an Unsupported Child's Benefit for
  • if you get Residential Care Subsidy or Residential Support Subsidy
  • if you're a student and get a Student Allowance from StudyLink
  • if you're living overseas and get a benefit under a reciprocal agreement, and
  • if they're Court Ordered lump sum payments.

The easiest way to tell us about these payments is online, using MyMSD.

See instructions on this page under 'How to tell us about child support using MyMSD'.

Once you've logged in to MyMSD, select 'Declare wages' and then 'Change other income'.

If there's already a child support payment recorded in MyMSD, they'll show on the home screen. You can change them from there.

The amount you declare will continue every week until you let us know it has stopped or changed. If your payment amount changes and you don't tell us, you could get into debt.

Information you need to tell us

You need to tell us:

  • how much the payment is
  • when you're paid
  • how often you get this payment.

Log in to MyMSD

 
Go to My MSD login

If you can't use MyMSD, you can call us

Inland Revenue (IR) shares your child support payment information with us under our Approved Information Sharing Agreement.

This means you don't need to tell us about most types of child support payments.

How we treat your child support as income

When we get your child support payment information from IR, our system will automatically treat this as income for the next month.

This means the next 4 or 5 weeks from the date you receive the child support payment. It could be 4 weeks, or 5 weeks, it depends on the number of weeks until you get your next child support payment from IR (as long as the paying parent has paid on time).

Our system will:

  • take the total amount of child support that IR has told us about
  • average it out over these 4 or 5 weeks so it's a weekly amount, and
  • update your benefit and other payments you get from us, based on this weekly income amount.

Having our system make these decisions is called Automated Decision Making (ADM).

Automated Decision Making for child support payments
Examples of how we treat your child support as income

When we'll send you a letter

We'll send you a letter if IR shares your child support information with us and your payments from us change.

The letter will tell you:

  • the amount of child support IR shared with us
  • what your average weekly amount of income is, and
  • how much your benefit or payment from us will be.

If you think there's an error with the child support information we've used, you can talk to us. We may need to contact IR to confirm your information.

If you get child support from Inland Revenue and Unsupported Child's Benefit (UCB) for the same child, there are different rules for what's counted as income.

Most people must apply for child support through IR

Most people who get UCB must apply for IR to assess and administer their child support payments. IR does this using a formula assessment.

The Government keeps the amount of child support that's equal to your benefit payment, and IR passes on any excess amount to you. For example, your benefit payment is $300. Your child support payment is $350. The Government keeps $300 and IR passes on $50 to you.

How we treat your child support as income

The excess amount you get from your formula assessment is only counted as income for these payments:

  • Temporary Additional Support
  • Special Benefit
  • Childcare Subsidy
  • OSCAR Subsidy.

The excess amount is not counted as income for your Unsupported Child's Benefit.

This means you only need to tell us about your child support payments if:

  • you get an excess amount from IR, and
  • you get one of the payments listed in the bullets above.

You can check how your income will affect your benefit using the income deduction tables.

Income deduction tables