Australian Baby Bonus

[mekka]

Well my wife gave birth to our first baby last night at Mission hospital in phuket, beautiful baby girl! Anyway ive been doing some research on the australian baby bonus offered by centrelink and from reading a thread on another forum it seems it is possible to have this granted evenb though i am staying in thailand "as a tourist of course"

The baby bonus would go a long way and im just wondering if anyone has had luck obtaining this.

I am an australia citizen, married to a thai national, staying in thailand on and off on tourist visa's as they do check travel patterns id say i still class as residing in Australia...all i need that im aware of is to obtain Australian Citizenship for the baby...now this may warrent another thread but any info on obtaining this would be helpful aswell as any personal experiences with the baby bonus application.

[moneyshot]

Hi Mekka,

Congratulations on the birth of your baby girl!

My wife and I are expecting a baby boy in April.

Being an Australian too, I have also thought about the baby bonus but have not looked into it yet. If you have any luck let me know.

I just emailed the Australian embassy with the question of citizenship and a passport for my son. Here is what they said.

Child's Australian citizenship

Before your child can be issued an Australian passport you must first apply for Australian citizenship by descent for a child born overseas. This application may be mailed in to the Embassy, you do not need to attend in person. Information is available at www.thailand.embassy.gov.au/bkok/DIMA05.html

Once you receive the citizenship certificate you will be able to apply for a child's passport via the following process:

Child's Australian passport

Please complete the child's passport application available at www.passports.gov.au Once the application is completed please print it out and sign the appropriate places. You will note that a person who has known your child for 1 year (or since birth) must sign the application & one photograph. Many people find it convenient to have their ob/gyn or family doctor sign the application for an infant child.

One parent must then come in person to lodge the application and be interviewed. We do not need to see the child. The parent must bring with them:

- fully completed application form

- 2 correctly endorsed photographs

- child's original birth certificate and English language translation

- child's original Australian citizenship certificate

- identification for both parents such as Australian or Thai passports (note: the names on the parents ID must match the names on the child's birth certificate)

- if parents current names do not match those on the birth cert you must present evidence of a name change (ie: marriage cert if your wife has changed her surname since the child was born, name change certificate if your name is different etc).

We will only need to see your original birth certificate if you are unable to present your Australian passport to show that you are the person listed as the father on the child's Thai birth certificate.

You must also pay the application fee, which is approximately THB 3,000 (32 page passport) or THB 4,500 (64 page passport). The exact fee will be advised on the day the application is made (as the fees vary with the exchange rate). This fee must be paid in cash on the day the application is accepted by our office.

The Australian Embassy is located at 37 South Sathorn Rd, Bangkok and open 0800 - 1630 Monday through Friday. No appointment is necessary.

Hope this helps...

Best of luck

[samran]

there is a residency test for it, so as long as the baby and parents return to australia within 26 weeks of birth to live, then it is legit. If not, then I suspect you are committing fraud - regardless of your visa status in Thailand. Checked it out myself. Having said that, they probably don't check.

Now, if you want some free dosh in OZ however, check out the super-co-contribution. No residency test.

[Chris Lawrence]

We came back to OZ in 06. Our son was 3months and 1 week old. We missed the cut off date by 1 week. (Samran, unless they have changed the rules we were told it was 13 weeks to have the child back in Australia)

The outcome was that I had to appeal the decision and state that it was always our intention to reside back in Australia. Of course our son was Australian by decent and has a Oz passport.

I don't know if this can be done offshore?

Mekka, congratulation's. Moneyshot is spot on with his post. U will need to do this and I believe have your daughter in Oz to claim the bonus. Don't know what is the cut off date if u got here say when she was 9 months and if an application could be done then? U might have to read the site from Centrlink about that.

Good luck

Chris

[mekka]

Thanks for the input so far guys, i have been told you can still claim it if you are overseas but stll classified as "residing in australia" and to do this they check your family ties, accounts, travel habits etc...i will sort out the citizenship first and then finish my application and let you know of the outcome as im sure there are many other aussies out here who could do with the bonus!

[david96]

Well my wife gave birth to our first baby last night at Mission hospital in phuket, beautiful baby girl! Anyway ive been doing some research on the australian baby bonus offered by centrelink and from reading a thread on another forum it seems it is possible to have this granted evenb though i am staying in thailand "as a tourist of course"

The baby bonus would go a long way and im just wondering if anyone has had luck obtaining this.

I am an australia citizen, married to a thai national, staying in thailand on and off on tourist visa's as they do check travel patterns id say i still class as residing in Australia...all i need that im aware of is to obtain Australian Citizenship for the baby...now this may warrent another thread but any info on obtaining this would be helpful aswell as any personal experiences with the baby bonus application.

All your questions answered here.

http://www.centrelink.gov.au/internet/inte...=1&Count=20

[Aussietraveller]

Hi All,

My wife and I got back to Australia with our baby late last year.

As long as you get back to Australia before the baby is 26 weeks old, you will be fine.

I would suspect that you will have to have the childs citizenship approved and Australian passport issued.

Centerlink wanted to see original birth certificate and certified Translation, as well as her passport with an entry date stamped in it.

Apart from Centerlink being a PITA to deal with, it was all fairly straightforward.

We had to apply to the ATO and get my wife a Tax File Number prior to Centerlink processing the claim.

But for $4000 it was worth a little running around.

[jackliveswhere]

I work in Indonesia and am a non-resident of australia now also. My wife is giving birth to a baby boy in June. I was looking into this until my project manager who is still an australian citizen but working in indonesia applied and got the baby bonus, it was 3 years later he was contacted and told that the baby had never been to australi in 2 years along with himself and that he was to refund it or face fraud charges...

With that I decided not to bother about it, but its up to you mate..