Your Right to Fair Scheduling of Job Search Appointments

1.5  Your Right to a ‘Reasonable Excuse’

Before your Employment Service Provider can issue a Provider Appointment Report to recommend to Centrelink that you should face a financial penalty for failing to attend an appointment or activity, they must contact you on the day of being made aware of the compliance to ensure a reasonable excuse “does not exist”.

This means that if your Employment Service Provider issues you with a financial penalty without contacting to see if you have a reasonable excuse, the penalty is illegal.

As stated in the Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline

“A Provider Appointment Report (PAR) can only be submitted after contact has taken place between the Provider and job seeker to confirm Reasonable Excuse does not exist.”                                                 

Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p. 9

1.5.1  Reasonable Excuse Definition

Under Social Security Law, a reasonable excuse has a very vague definition. Below is a excerpt of the Job Seeker Compliance Framework issued by the Government:

“When determining whether a reason for non-attendance is valid, Providers will need to use their judgement and knowledge of the job seeker. Generally, the measure of ‘validity’ is whether a member of the public would accept the circumstances as reasonable. For example, given that the focus is for job seekers to develop work-like behaviours and move into sustainable paid employment, would the reason that the job seeker provides be accepted by an employer?

Based on the discussion with the job seeker, the Provider must assess whether the jobseeker had a Reasonable Excuse for failing to comply with the requirement. A ‘Reasonable Excuse’ is an excuse that would seem reasonable to a member of the public. Given that each situation is different, Providers need to consider what is reasonable in the specific context of the non-compliance.

There are two stages in assessing whether the job seeker has a Reasonable Excuse for failing to comply with the requirement:

Providers must consider why the job seeker did not comply.

If the job seeker provides an acceptable reason, the Provider must then consider why the job seeker did not give prior notice. Where a job seeker does not give prior notice of their inability to attend and it would be reasonable to have expected them to do so, they do not have a Reasonable Excuse. In some instances, prior notice will not be relevant for Providers to consider—for example; inappropriate behaviour or declining suitable paid employment”

Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p. 6-7

1.5.2  Unreasonable Excuse Determination

For an Employment Service Provider to find an Unemployed Worker’s excuse unreasonable the Employment Service Provider are required to meet the following requirements:

• Providers must ensure they have mechanisms in place in their organisation to allow job seekers to make timely contact with their Provider—for example, answering machine, dedicated job seeker phone lines or the ability to accept reverse charge phone calls from job seekers.
• The attempt to contact the job seeker can only be made by phone or email, because the decision on the next steps (that is, whether the compliance framework should be utilised) must be made on the same Business Day.
• The Provider then needs to determine what is acceptable in the context of the specific situation. Providers must consider why the job seeker was unable to meet their requirements and whether it is a valid excuse for non-attendance.
• Providers should consider the degree of flexibility afforded to the job seeker in the past and what effect has this had on the job seeker’s compliance with requirements (for example, have there been many instances of non-attendance or have Appointments/activities repeatedly been rescheduled).
• In instances where a job seeker makes contact before their requirement but did not have a Valid Reason for not being able to meet their requirement and was advised that they were still required to attend, the Provider must still attempt to contact the job seeker on the same day that they miss that requirement and document this attempt in the Department’s IT Systems. This is to confirm that no other circumstances prevented the job seeker from attending. Unless other circumstances prevented the job seeker from attending, the job seeker does not have a Valid Reason for non-compliance.

Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p. 6

1.5.3  Your Right to Reasonable Notice

If you are required to attend an appointment or activity, your Employment Service Provider must ensure that it gives reasonable notice ahead of the Appointment or day of the activity. Reasonable notice gives Unemployed Workers sufficient time to prepare for the requirement – for example, to arrange transportation.

So what is reasonable notice?

It depends on how you are contacted.

• If your provider contacts you by phone, face to face, or handed a letter to organise an appointment or activity, you must be given 3 Calendar days notice. 

Note: If you are contacted by phone, the provider must speak directly to the job seeker.

• If you are contacted you by email (only available when it is the job seeker’s notification preference), you must be given 2 business days notice. 

Note: For an email notification to be valid, Providers must ensure that the job seeker has read and understood the email—for example, by using a ‘read receipt’—at least one day before the Appointment or activity. Where the job seeker does not respond to email notification, another method should be used.

• If you are contacted by mail, you must be given 4 business days notice.

Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, pp. 4-5

If formal notification was not given adequately, then Providers cannot punish job seekers:

Recording job seeker notifications Providers must keep a record of all notifications issued to a job seeker through the Department’s IT Systems. If a Provider subsequently decides to use the job seeker compliance framework, they need to show that formal notification was issued to the job seeker so that DHS can be satisfied that the job seeker was properly notified and fully aware of their requirements.

Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p.5

However, according to Social Security Law the Employment Service Providers can simply by-pass these rules by simply organising an appointment or activity directly with the unemployed worker as long as they agree:

“Where an Appointment or participation in an activity has been arranged directly between the Provider and job seeker and the job seeker has indicated their intent to attend, reasonable notice is considered to have been given, even if the Appointment or participation in the activity is on the same day as the notification”

                                                           Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p. 5

This relies on the job seeker not knowing their rights. If your Employment Provider tries to organise an appointment or activity without the required notice, simply inform them of your rights.

1.5.4  Rescheduling an Appointment after a Penalty

After submission of either a Non-Attendence Report or Provider Appointment Report (PAR) and following successful contact taking place with the job seeker, Providers are responsible for re-engaging job seekers by booking Appointments that must be scheduled to occur within the next two Business Days of contact occurring with the job seeker.

For all Participation Reports and Provider Appointment Reports submitted, DHS will investigate the incident to determine if a failure occurred, which includes whether Reasonable Excuse existed and whether a participation failure should apply and why. DHS will inform the job seeker of any penalties applied. Providers must have timeslot capacity at all times in the Department’s IT Systems to ensure that DHS can book an Appointment for a job seeker within the next two Business Days.

  Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p. 11

Where DHS decides that a penalty should be applied, the job seeker will lose a day’s income support payment for each Business Day from the date they were notified of the payment suspension until they do attend a Re-engagement Appointment.

Job Seeker Compliance Framework Guideline, p. 9