About income estimations

You can estimate your income for child support when it has dropped by at least 15% from the income used in your formula assessment.

For a paying (liable) parent, this may mean you pay less child support. For a receiving carer, this may mean you get more child support.

If the child lives with each parent some of the time, estimating can even change who pays child support.

Who can estimate

Both the paying parent and receiving carer can estimate their income. Non-parent carers cannot estimate their income because it is not used in the formula assessment.

When you can estimate

You can estimate during the current tax year (1 April to 31 March), or for the upcoming tax year, if you already have your child support assessment or entitlement notice.

For us to accept your estimation, you also need to meet all the following requirements.

• You expect your total income for the year to be at least 15% lower than the amount on your assessment notice.
• Child support is still going, or it ended in the current month. For example, if it ended on 10 May, you can estimate up till 31 May.
• If you were to earn the new lower income for a whole year, the year's income would be lower than the amount used on your notice. This is called annualised income. It makes sure that you’ll be better off if we accept your estimation.
• Your income or the payment amount has not been set by court order or child support review – in these cases, you need to go back to court or apply for a new review.

Overseas income

If you earn income overseas in a country that has a different tax year, you still need to estimate your income for the New Zealand tax year – 1 April to 31 March.

Providing proof

You may need to send us proof of your estimated income. For example, if your estimation includes income from self-employment or overseas income.

We’ll only ask you for proof if we need it. Otherwise, you do not need to provide it along with your estimation.

Start and finish dates

Your estimation starts on 1 April if you estimate:

• before the tax year begins on 1 April
• during the month of April.

If you estimate during the year (from 1 May onwards), your estimation starts from the 1st of the month you estimated in.

New to child support

Your estimation starts on the same date as your child support if both the following apply.

• You're new or returning to child support.
• You estimate within 28 days of the date on your assessment letter.

This may be in a previous month or year.

For example, we send you a child support assessment letter in late December, showing your child support starts on 20 December. You estimate your income on 16 January, and we accept it. Your estimation starts from 20 December.

Finish date

All estimations finish at the end of the tax year (31 March) unless you cancel them.

Cancel your income estimation

If your income changes again

If your income changes after you’ve estimated, you can estimate again, as long as you still meet the requirements. If you estimated less than 3 months ago, your income must have changed by at least $500 before we can accept a new estimation.

If your income goes up after you estimated and you no longer meet the requirements, call us. You may need to cancel your estimation. For example, if your total income has dropped by less than 15%. Otherwise, you may end up with a bill once your child support is squared up.

If you cancel your estimation partway through the year, you may have a bill to pay. Call us to talk about your situation and work out what’s best for you.

At the end of the year

After the tax year ends on 31 March, we’ll square up your estimation to see if you paid or received the right amount of child support.

We use whichever of these 2 options is the lower amount.

1. The actual income you earned in the period you estimated.
2. The original income we used to work out your child support.

If your income was higher than what you estimated, you may have a bill to pay.

If your estimation includes overseas income, you'll need to send us proof of this income after the year ends on 31 March.