Travel outside Australia

If you leave Australia to live in another country, your payment will stop when you depart.

If your travel is short term, your payment will stop when you depart, unless you’re travelling for an approved reason.

What the approved reasons are

There are some approved reasons for overseas travel.

Family crisis, humanitarian reasons or medical treatment

You may get Farm Household Allowance if you’re travelling outside Australia for an approved reason. If granted, you’ll get your payment for the time required to deal with the reason. This will generally be 2-3 weeks. The maximum period is 6 weeks.

The approved reasons are:

• to attend an acute family crisis - for example, to visit a family member who’s critically ill
• for specific humanitarian reasons - for example, to adopt a child or attend custody proceedings
• to get eligible medical treatment that isn’t available in Australia.

Evidence we need

You must provide detailed evidence that supports the reason for travel. The evidence you need to provide depends on the circumstances.

Evidence may include any of the following:

• a death certificate for the family member
• a medical certificate from an overseas hospital
• a statement from police
• a court order
• a letter from your treating doctor
• other documents relating to the reason for travel.

If you don’t give us the evidence before you leave Australia, your payment may stop when you depart. If we’ve stopped your payment, we’ll reassess it once we get your evidence.

Example

Billy is paid Farm Household Allowance. They tell Centrelink they’re travelling to Finland as their brother has been in a serious car accident and is in hospital in a critical condition. Centrelink tell Billy their circumstances may meet the criteria of an acute family crisis, which would mean their Farm Household Allowance can be paid for a short time while they’re overseas.

Billy will need to give evidence confirming the situation before the assessment can be finalised and they can be paid. Billy said they will get evidence while in Finland and upload it when they return to Australia. This means the assessment will happen after Billy returns to Australia, so Billy’s Farm Household Allowance stops when they depart Australia.

While in Finland, Billy gets a certificate from the hospital that states their brother’s name, date of birth and date of admission and details the critical condition he’s in. After 2 weeks, Billy’s brother’s situation improves and Billy returns to Australia. Billy uploads their evidence, which confirms the situation is an acute family crisis. They’re paid Farm Household Allowance for the 2 weeks they were in Finland.

Alternative situations

If Billy’s brother had died while they were there, they could contact Centrelink and request further payment under the acute family crisis provision. They would need to provide a death certificate, as well as the initial medical certificate.

If Billy decided to stay longer in Finland to visit family and travel, they wouldn’t be paid for that time as it wasn’t due to the acute family crisis. Billy’s Farm Household Allowance would suspend at the end of the approved period. If they returned to Australia within 13 weeks of suspension, their payment could be restored. If they returned after 13 weeks, they would need to lodge a new claim.

Defence training

If you’re attending an Australian Defence Force Reserves training camp, you’ll get your payment for the duration of the training.

Evidence we need

You need to give us a written statement from the camp commander or the person in charge. It must show all of the following:

• camp details
• duration of the camp including the start and end dates of the camp
• camp location.

You can upload your evidence using your Centrelink online account through myGov.