The Australian government offers severe financial hardship crisis payments to Australians for various situations. The one-off payment is a non-taxable payment that helps the recipient in times of crisis.
Australian citizens experiencing financial hardship can check out this payment. The government has set the eligibility criteria for such payments to ensure that the hardship payment helps eligible citizens. People wondering about the Centrelink Hardship boost can find everything they need to know here.
Centrelink Hardship Boost
The Australian government intends to support the citizens in their every financial hardship and ensure that people can deal with their crisis. One such payment is the crisis payment, which helps the citizens in severe financial hardships that happen due to different extreme circumstances.
The government understands the difficulties of the people during certain extreme situations and arranges this one-off payment to help them and survive the crisis. The Australians who are facing any financial hardships can check out this payment and see if they can claim these benefits or not.
The Australian government might boost the hardship payment in the coming months as the indexation process is approaching. The government updates and adjusts the benefit payment based on inflation through the regular indexation update to ensure people receive enough payment to survive the rising cost of living.
Though the government has not announced any boost for the 2025 hardship payment, the citizens or humanitarian entrants can expect the boost in payment in the coming months.
Circumstances for Centrelink Crisis Payment
The Australian government offers the crisis payment when you are experiencing the following circumstances and facing severe financial hardships:
- You have to leave your house due to some circumstances, and now you can return to your home or in the near future, increasing your financial problems;
- You were forced to leave your house due to some incident in your family or domestic violence.
- You are living at your home after the domestic violence, and the person responsible for the domestic violence has left or was removed from the house, and now you are living alone and have lower financial support;
- You arrive in Australia as a humanitarian entrant for the first time and need financial assistance.
- For at least 14 days, you were in psychiatric confinement or prison and facing financial hardships.
Who can receive the Centrelink Hardship benefit?
As mentioned above, the citizens or humanitarian entrant can receive the crisis payment to deal with their severe financial hardships when they are in certain circumstances. The eligibility for each crisis is different depending on the situation.
So, Australians or humanitarian entrants who wish to get this Centrelink one-off payment should check this Service Australia page. For instance, the Australians can check the eligibility conditions for the unexpected circumstance that leads to financial hardships below:
- You must be eligible for ABSTUDY living allowance or income support payment and facing severe financial hardships;
- You were forced to leave your residence due to fire, flood, violence, or any unreasonable reason;
- Now, you need to establish a new home for living in Australia;
- When the extreme circumstances happened to you, you must have been living in Australia.
The Australians who wish to check their eligibility for the crisis payment for severe financial hardships can check it at https://www.servicesaustralia.gov.au/crisis-payment.
How much payment can you receive under the Centrelink Hardship payment?
The Australian government offers one-time support to the citizens in various circumstances mentioned above; the payment to deal with each circumstance must be different. However, the Australian citizens can check the payment or conditions for each crisis below:
- For extreme circumstances, your payment will be equal to the maximum basic rate of income support you receive weekly or equal to the ABSTUDY Living allowance.
- For a crisis of family and domestic violence, you will receive up to four payments in a year and they will equal the income support weekly basic rate or living allowance;
- For a humanitarian entrant, the payment will be equal to the income support weekly basic rate.
- For a crisis related to release from psychiatric confinement or prison, the eligible individuals will receive the payment equal to the weekly basic rate of income support payment.
The Australian government also has a special payment for people who are not eligible for the income support payment and are facing any financial hardship. The Australians can check the Special Benefit Assistance on Services Australia.
However, if you wish to receive the crisis payment, you should first claim the income support of the ABSTUDY Living allowance.
How can you apply for the Centrelink Hardship payment?
The Australians or people living in Australia who are experiencing any of the mentioned circumstances and need support from the government can apply for the crisis payment online in the following steps:
- You should first sign in to myGov or create an account if you don’t have one.
- Next, you should go to the Centerlink and select the Payment and Claims option.
- Next, you should go to the claim and click the Make a claim option.
- Now, select the crisis payment in the Make Claim option and apply for the circumstances that fit well with your situation.
- Next, you have to answer a few questions, answer them carefully, and upload the evidence of your circumstances and financial hardships.
- After submitting the supporting documents, submit your crisis payment claim.
People who can’t apply online can download the form from the Services Australia website and fill out the form. You must submit the form with the supporting documents, and in the situation you also have to submit the claim within a certain limit, so do check that on the Services Australia website.
After you make your claim for the crisis payment, make sure you have saved your claim ID to check the claim status later.
The Australian government supports the people living in the country through various benefits to ensure they can deal with the financial hardship and survive the crisis. So, if you are facing any hardships, you should check the Crisis payment and apply for it timely.