If you're seeking to access your super to pay an expense for another person, you must have a dependent relationship with that person.
If your relationship meets the requirements of an interdependency relationship or substantial financial dependency relationship, you need to provide evidence of the relationship.
Read the following information to:
- work out if your relationship meets the relevant criteria
- understand any additional evidence you may need to provide.
Applications submitted with incomplete evidence may be delayed or not approved.
Who is a dependant
A person can be considered your dependant if they meet the criteria for one of the following categories:
Spouse
A spouse is someone who is either:
- legally married to you
- a person who is recognised as being in a registered relationship with you under a state or territory law
- not legally married to you but lives with you on a genuine domestic basis in a relationship as a couple.
If you're applying to pay for the expense of your spouse, you are not required to provide any additional evidence to support this in your application.
Child
A child is someone less than 18 years old.
To be considered your dependant, the child must be either your:
- biological child
- adopted child
- stepchild
- a child within the meaning of the Family Law Act 1975.
If you're applying to pay for the expense of your child who meets one of these criteria, you're not required to provide any additional evidence to support this in your application.
If your application is to pay for the expenses of your child who is 18 years or older, you'll need to prove that either an interdependency relationship or a substantial financial dependency relationship exists between you and your child.
Interdependency relationship
An interdependency relationship is a relationship between 2 people that meets all the following conditions:
- they have a close personal relationship
- they live together
- one of each of them provides the other with financial support
- one or each of them provides the other with domestic support and personal care.
You may also be considered to have an interdependency relationship if you have a close personal relationship but live apart temporarily. An example is if one or both of you are:
- temporarily working or studying interstate or overseas
- detained in prison
- receiving care for a physical, intellectual or psychiatric disability.
Evidence of an interdependency relationship
To show that you are in an interdependency relationship with another person, you need to provide the following information:
- Documents showing that you both live at the same address or, if you're temporarily living apart, that you normally live together. Examples include a joint bank statement or a phone or utility bill.
- If you are temporarily living apart, your application needs to explain why.
- Evidence of the financial support provided, including bank statements from either people that clearly shows payments to the other person or made on their behalf.
- A statutory declaration detailing all the circumstances of the relationship between the persons, including (where relevant)
- duration of the relationship
- whether or not a sexual relationship exists
- degree of mutual commitment to a shared life
- ownership, use and acquisition of property
- care and support of children
- public aspects of your relationship
- degree of emotional support provided to each other
- degree to which the relationship is one of mere convenience
- any information that indicates you intend for the relationship to be permanent.
Example 1: evidence to support interdependency
Alix makes an application for compassionate release of super to modify her home to accommodate her adult son’s special needs, which come from a severe disability. To support her application that her son is a dependant, both Alix and her son provide:
- separate statutory declarations that
- they have shared and continue to share a close and personal relationship for over 2 years
- they have lived together for more than 2 years
- they provide domestic support in the form of cleaning and cooking and emotional support to each other, given they have no other living relatives
- due to her son's disability he can't live on his own, so the current situation will be permanent
- a driver's license or other personal identification confirming they live at the same address
- copies of bank statements showing that Alix has been providing financial support of $100 a week to her son for the last 8 years.
As they live together Alix is also able to show that she pays for all bills and everyday expenses for her and her son.
In this case we are satisfied that an interdependency relationship exists between Alix and her son.
End of exampleSubstantial financial dependency
A person is substantially financially dependent on another where one person is unable to meet their normal living expenses without the financial support of the other person.
Your application needs to include information and financial documents that show:
- you make regular, continuous and substantial financial payments to, or on behalf of, the other person
- these payments cover all or a substantial portion of the person's normal living expenses
- the person would be unable to afford their normal living expenses (such as groceries, mortgage or rent, transportation costs, utility bills and medical expenses) without these payments.
Evidence of substantial financial dependency
To prove you're in a substantial financial dependency relationship with another person, you need to provide both:
- a written statement, letter or statutory declaration from yourself or the dependant that includes the following information about the relationship
- how regularly financial support is provided
- the value of financial support provided
- the duration of the financially dependent relationship
- whether the other person's normal living expenses are financed by these payments
- the level of reliance the other person has on the financial support provided
- whether the other person has any other sources of income and, if so, the value
- any other information that supports the nature of the financially dependant relationship
- financial documents that
- support the written statement, letter or statutory declaration and clearly demonstrate that you have financially supported the other person to meet their normal living expenses (such as groceries, mortgage payments or rent, transportation costs, utility bills, medical expenses) on a regular basis for a significant period of time
- show the other person couldn't meet their living expenses without your financial support.
Financial documents that can demonstrate the financial support include:
- your and the other person's bank statements (for the same period) showing
- transfer and receipt of money to, or on behalf of, the other person
- how the money is used to fund the other person's normal living expenses
- any income the other person is receiving
- receipts for expenses you have paid on behalf of the other person
- documents detailing any employment payments or government help provided to the other person that show any other income they have.
Note: All documents need to show who they were issued to. Where you are providing bank statements, you need to ensure that the account holder's name and statement period are visible.
Example 2: evidence to support substantial financial dependency
Dev makes an application for compassionate release of super for medical treatment for his mother. Dev and his mother share a close relationship, and he supports his mother financially, even though they don't live together.
To demonstrate that a substantial financial dependency relationship exists, Dev provides us with:
- copies of bank statements from himself and his mother showing fortnightly transfers of money to support his mother. These show that
- his mother used the money transferred by Dev to buy essential everyday living items
- the arrangement has been occurring for more than 12 months
- Dev’s mother doesn't receive any other income or financial assistance.
- copies of receipts for shopping expenses, medical expenses and rent payments that Dev has been paying for his mother for more than 12 months
- statutory declarations from both Dev and his mother detailing
- the financial support Dev provides to his mother
- how his mother wouldn't be able to maintain a basic standard of living without the support Dev provides.
The supporting bank statements and receipts substantiate the statutory declarations provided by both Dev and his mother.
Given the breadth of supporting material provided by Dev and his mother, we're satisfied that a substantial financial dependency relationship exists.
End of example