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Superceded by an Approved Information Sharing Agreement “Privacy (Information Sharing Agreement between Inland Revenue and Ministry of Social Development) Order 2017”. Further information is available here, and on the Inland Revenue website.
Purpose: To identify people who qualify for a Community Services Card (CSC) based on their level of income and number of children.
IR disclosure to MSD: For individual tax payers who have received Working for Families Tax Credits (WfFTC), IR provides MSD with the full name, address, annual income and IRD number of the primary carer (and partner if any), the number of children in their care and dates of birth, and the annual amount of WfFTC.
| Information matching provision | Tax Administration Act 1994, s.83 |
| Year authorised | 1991 |
| Year operation commenced | 1992 |
| Year replaced by AISA | 2017 |
| Programme type | Confirming eligibility Identifying unclaimed entitlement |
| Unique identifiers | Tax file number |
System description
IR provides a fortnightly extract of individual taxpayers who have received family support tax credits. The data is transferred on an encrypted USB 'Ironkey' which is hand delivered or sent by registered courier.
The IR file is matched against the MSD system SWIFTT and, for valid matches, the total income information provided by IR to MSD is checked against the income entitlement limits for the CSC. The income limits vary depending upon the number of dependent children. IR records that do not match SWIFTT records are ignored.
Existing holders of a CSC whose continuing eligibility is confirmed in this match, receive a renewal flag on their SWIFTT file, so that a new card is automatically generated when the existing card expires.
Existing holders of a CSC whose eligibility is not confirmed by this match are sent a letter advising that the holder appears now to be over the income limit and so their current card will not be renewed automatically (s103 notice).
Beneficiaries who are identified in this match as being potentially eligible and who are not currently holding a CSC are sent a letter advising that they appear to be eligible and enclosing an application form in case they wish to apply.
Recent activity
| 2012/13 | 2013/14 | 2014/15 | 2015/16 | 2016/17 | |
| Runs | 50 | 50 | 48 | 51 | 51 |
| Records received for matching[1] | 1,585,655 | 1,564,945 | 1,470,925 | 1,500,118 | 1,432,903 |
| CSC Cards automatically renewed[2] | 171,541 | 155,217 | 117,387 | 131,763 | 122,914 |
| 'Invitation to Apply' forms sent out | 85,899 | 92,845 | 88,153 | 90,791 | 90,193 |
| Notices of adverse action | 20,577 | 20,123 | 19,381 | 19,500 | 16,531 |
| Challenges | 59 | 36 | 17 | 2 | 8 |
| Challenges upheld | 59 | 34 | 15 | 1 | 5 |
The utility of this provision was assessed in the report “MSD, MoE and ACC Matches (July 2014)".
[1] Includes changes in income requiring their eligibility be reassessed.
[2] These figures do not include cards automatically issued to students based upon a match between Studylink and Work and Income.
