If you’re on a Disability Support Pension and plan to travel overseas, the period you can receive your pension is four weeks in any 12 month period. This has reduced from six weeks.
Since 1 January 2015, if you are outside Australia for more than four weeks in a 12 month period your payment may stop. However, your payment will not be affected if you have been assessed in Australia as having a permanent, severe impairment and no future work capacity.
You may also continue to receive your payment if you’re travelling for one of the following approved reasons:
- attending an acute family crisis—for example, to visit an immediate family member who is critically ill
- humanitarian reasons—for example, to adopt a child or attend custody proceedings, or
- if you’re receiving eligible medical treatment that is not available in Australia
If you booked and paid for travel before 14 May 2014, you will be able to retain the six week payment period which existed when you made your bookings as long as you have completed this travel and returned to Australia before 1 January 2016.
For more information visit the Department of Human Services Webpage article
For more information on the Disability Support Pension please visit Department of Human Services DSP