Earlier changes

What's new

26 May 2026

Counting previous obligations failures

Information about counting previous obligations failures has been amended to reflect the end of the transitional arrangements on 26 May 2026. Transitional content relating to the previous 12-month failure count period has been removed or updated. All applicable obligation failures are now counted over a 24-month period, except for youth activity obligation failures, which continue to be counted for 12 months.

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6 May 2026

Initial stand-down periods

The current initial stand-down periods have been updated with the change to the gross Average Ordinary Time Weekly Wage (AOTWW) rate at 6 May 2026. See:

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15 April 2026

Care and protection concerns for a child or young person

Information about care and protection concerns for a child or young person has been added to pages in the changes and reviews sections of relevant manuals.

If MSD believes any child has been, or is likely to be harmed (physically, emotionally or sexually), ill-treated, abused, neglected, deprived or MSD has concerns about the wellbeing of the child, the case must be referred to Oranga Tamariki.

This includes when a sole caregiver is remanded in custody and/or sentenced to a term of imprisonment.

See:

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13 April 2026

Introduction of 12-month prescriptions

From 1 February 2026, prescribers have had the option to write prescriptions for up to 12 months (an increase from the previous 3-6 months).

This change will reduce the number of co-payments that clients are required to make, and may also affect ongoing assistance that MSD provides to cover their prescription costs - such as Disability Allowance and Temporary Additional Support. Clients with a Community Services Card or SuperGold Card may also be affected by this change.

See:

These topics have also been updated to remove out-of-date information about residency requirements.

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