Confirming your circumstances – living overseas
If you're receiving certain payments while living overseas, we must review your circumstances every 52 weeks. This helps us to make sure you get the correct assistance and amount.
We’ll confirm your circumstances each year if you’re getting NZ payments overseas for:
- New Zealand Superannuation
- Veteran's Pension
- Supported Living Payment
- Widow's Benefit.
If you are living in New Zealand, the process for confirming your circumstances can be found here:
Information we need from you
As part of this review, we may send you either a Confirming your Circumstances form (if you're getting Supported Living Payment or Widow's Benefit) or a Client Declaration form (if you get New Zealand Super or Veteran's Pension). We'll ask you to fill out the form to confirm the information we hold about you is up to date, including telling us about any changes to your circumstances.
Depending on the payment you receive, this may include information about your family, work, income, assets, living arrangements, and contact details. We may also ask for documents to confirm your circumstances and make sure you receive the right support.
We will send your review information at least 45 working days (about 9 weeks) before your review is due.
It's important that you return your completed form promptly and any supporting documents before the due date, even if nothing has changed. If you don't respond before the due date, your payments will automatically stop on the due date.
If you think you may have difficulty completing your form on time or you are unable to respond to the review, you must contact us before the due date. In some situations, we may be able to give you more time to complete your form or give you an exemption (if you are unable to respond to the review). You need to contact us before your due date to discuss your situation, or your payments will automatically stop on the due date.
Step 1 – Complete the form
We'll send your form either through MyMSD or by post, depending on how you usually receive information from us. This will be at least 45 working days (about nine weeks) before your review is due.
You'll need to:
- Fill out the form
- Return the completed form to us before the due date.
If you tell us that your circumstances have changed, we may ask for more information or supporting documents before we can complete your review.
Step 2 – Provide more information, if needed
Once we receive your form, we'll check the information you've provided. If we need more information from you, we'll contact you and let you know what we need.
You can provide supporting documents by:
scanning and emailing them to us
posting them to us.
Step 3 - We’ll process your information
When you return your form, our staff will process it and let you know if we need any further information.
Changes to your circumstances may affect whether you're eligible for your payment or how much you receive. We'll let you know what will happen next.
If you don’t return your form by the review date, we will stop your payments using automated decision-making.
We'll always tell you when we’ve used an automated decision-making (ADM) process to make a decision that affects you.
- For questions related to the use of ADM visit the webpage: Automated decision-making
- Email international_services@msd.govt.nz, or
- Phone the International Services team: +64 4 978 1180