Appeal an Inland Revenue decision

If you’re unhappy with a decision made by Inland Revenue after you asked for an administrative review, you can ask the Family Court for a Departure Order. You can apply for a Departure Order at any time after an administrative review.

If someone else asked for a review and Inland Revenue changed the child support you receive, you can appeal the decision in the Family Court.

You need to appeal within two months of the decision.

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Departure Orders

A Departure Order is a written decision from the Family Court that tells Inland Revenue to assess your child support in a different way. You can apply for this at any time after an administrative review decision.

You can ask the Family Court for a Departure Order if Inland Revenue has:

  • made a decision about your application for an administrative review, you’re the person asking for the review (applicant) and you disagree with that decision
  • refused to make a decision on your case because it's not straightforward, and you’re either the person asking for the review (applicant) or the person it affects (respondent).

If you’re a paying parent, you can’t apply for an assessment of less than the minimum weekly payment of child support.

How to apply for a Departure Order

Note: When you print the forms it's important to print them single sided.

  1. Fill in these two forms:
    Application for departure from formula assessment in special circumstances – CS13 [PDF, 83 KB]
    Affidavit of financial means and their sources – CS28 [PDF, 280 KB]
  2. File your application. If Inland Revenue is the other party, you need to file your application in the Family Court closest to your nearest Inland Revenue Office. Find out more about how to file documents

Where to get help to apply for a Departure Order

If you need help to fill in the forms, you can:

Find out more about affidavits and statutory declarations

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Appeal Inland Revenue’s decision in the Family Court

If you decide to appeal Inland Revenue’s decision, you need to do this within two months of the decision.

You may appeal for any of these reasons:

  • Inland Revenue hasn’t accepted an application for a formula assessment when you believe it should have, or it has accepted an application for a formula assessment when you believe it shouldn’t have.
  • You believe Inland Revenue acted wrongly by:
    • not accepting your estimate of your current income
    • charging penalties resulting from that estimate
    • accepting or refusing to accept an application for a voluntary agreement, a variation of one or a change of circumstances
    • refusing to exempt you from child support payments or to refund overpayments
    • granting or refusing to grant a suspension of child support payments.
  • You’re the paying parent and an assessment notice gives wrong information about your income, child support amount or the number of days the child support is payable.
  • The assessment doesn’t take into account a provision of the Child Support Act 1991.
  • You’re the person who applied for an exemption review and the Commissioner of Inland Revenue has refused to accept your application.
  • You’re a paying parent or custodian and you disagree with the Commissioner’s decision following a review.
  • You’re the respondent in an administrative review and you disagree with the Commissioner’s decision following the review hearing.

How to apply for an appeal

  1. Fill in one of these forms. Choose the one that fits your situation:
    Notice of appeal against Commissioner's decision to accept application for formula assessment of child support – CS5 [PDF, 132 KB]
    Notice of appeal against Commissioner's decision to refuse to accept application for formula assessment of child support – CS7 [PDF, 111 KB]
    Notice of appeal against other administrative decisions of Commissioner – CS9 [PDF, 89 KB]
    Notice of appeal against assessment – CS11 [PDF, 18 KB]
    Notice of appeal against Commissioner's determination or decision under subpart 3 of Part 5A of Act – CS12A [PDF, 355 KB]
    Notice of appeal by respondent against Commissioner's determination under Part 6A of Act – CS12C [PDF, 34 KB]
    Notice of appeal against Commissioner's determination under Part 6B of Act – CS12E [PDF, 34 KB]
  2. Also fill in: General affidavit [PDF, 38 KB] and a G7 info sheet [PDF, 44 KB]. In addition, if you've used forms CS5, CS7, CS9 or CS11, your affidavit must include a copy of your notice of objection to Inland Revenue and a copy of Inland Revenue’s notice of disallowance.
  3. File your application. If Inland Revenue is the other party, you need to file your application in the Family Court closest to your nearest Inland Revenue Office.
    Find out more about how to file documents

Where to get help to apply for an appeal

If you need help to fill in the forms you can:

Find out more about affidavits and statutory declarations

What happens next?

After the Court processes your application, it will arrange for the documents to be served on (given to) the other person and provide a copy to IR.

Respond to an application for a Departure Order or Notice of Appeal

If you’ve received a copy of the application for a Departure Order or a Notice of Appeal against a Commissioner’s decision, you can file a notice of defence.

You must respond within 21 working days unless the Court has told you otherwise.

To respond to an application for a Departure Order or Notice of Appeal, fill in the following forms:

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