Help completing an online application for financial assistance

Use your RealMe® login from another agency or choose the option to create a RealMe login on the login screen.

You’ll need an email address and a mobile phone number to create a RealMe login. Contact us if you can’t create a RealMe login.

Remember that your RealMe username and password are case-sensitive.

Select Apply Online and choose ‘I forgot my username’ or ‘I forgot my password’ from the login screen and follow the steps.

You’ll need to enter the email address or mobile number you registered with RealMe.

If it’s your password that you forgot, you’ll also need to answer your security questions. The answers to your security questions are case-sensitive.

An email or text message will be sent to you with your username or a temporary password. When you log in with a temporary password, you’ll be asked to change your password.

Log in to Apply Online and you’ll see a list of the applications that you’ve:

• saved and can continue working on or delete
• submitted.

Saved application

To continue with a saved application, select ‘Continue with application’.

Submitted application

You cannot view a submitted application, only the date when you submitted it. If you provided an email address in your application you’ll be sent an email with a reference number and ‘next steps’ instruction.

Changes to your submitted application

Once you've submitted your application you won't be able to change it. If you need to make changes contact us. If you provided an email address in your application you’ll be sent an email with a reference number that we can use to access details of your application for you.

You may need to complete a new application depending on your changes as the online application automatically works out the type of financial assistance you might get depending on the answers you provide.

You’ll be automatically logged out of our Online Services if you stay on the same page for more than five minutes. This is done to help protect the privacy of your information. When you log back in, you can continue with your application from the last completed page.

Some questions that you may need help on will have a ‘Help’ link on top. Click on ‘Help’ for more information on the question.

If you select ‘Next’ on the page and you can’t proceed to the next page of the application, you may have:

• not answered the mandatory questions on the current page
• typed in characters that can’t be accepted by the online form (you can only enter certain characters in the text box, eg no extra spaces or characters other than letters or numbers)
• checked the box after the questions indicating you have another information to add, eg income or past employment information.

To continue to the next page:

• answer the mandatory questions on the current page marked with a red asterisk (*)
• check the error message on the page (above the questions) and correct the errors
• make sure you un-tick the box after the questions indicating you have another information to add
• select 'Help' on the page for information about some of the questions on the page.

On the page where you enter your contact details, there will be two text boxes per phone numbers. Enter the area code or mobile prefix number on the first text box and number on the second one. Don’t include any brackets (), dash or hyphens.

Unless you’re advised otherwise, enter the amount in NZ dollar value without any symbols, eg 570.25

You’ll get an error and won’t be able to continue to the next page if you enter letters, extra space or symbols eg dollar sign ($)

If your income changes from week to week provide an average, for example, the average of your last four weeks’ pay.

If you can’t continue to the next page of the application, check the error message on the page (above the questions) for information.

The Co-operative Bank

The Co-operative Bank has the same prefix as the BNZ. Select 02- BNZ as your account prefix.

Credit unions

Credit unions will have given you an account number for the bank that they use. Use this bank account number, not your credit union customer number. If you don’t have this bank account number, contact your Credit Union.

Invalid bank account number

Please check your account number against your bank statement through online banking or by calling your bank.

If you get stuck on the ‘employment’ page where it keeps asking for your employment information even if you’ve entered this already, you may have ticked the box on the page indicating that you have had other employment in the last 52 weeks.

To continue to the next page of the application un-tick the box and then select the 'next' button.

You’ll need to delete any duplicate employment information at the section summary page.

Unfortunately questions have to apply to both single and people who are in a relationship. If you’re single you can ignore the reference to a partner.

If your partner doesn’t have an Inland Revenue number or bank account, enter your details instead and discuss this with your case manager at your appointment.

“An error has occurred”

If you get this error message, you’ve been logged out of our Online Services. You’ll be automatically logged out of our Online Services if you stay on the same page for five minutes or more. This helps protect your privacy.

Select ‘Continue’ to go back to the Online Services homepage and log in again to Apply Online. When you log back in, you can continue with your application from the last completed page.

“Do not use the browser back button, please use the “Back” button on the page.”

If you get this message, you may have:

• used your browser’s back button instead of the “back” button on the financial assistance page
• gone back and forth of your online application too many times.

Select ‘Click here to continue’ to go back to the Online Services homepage and log in again to Apply Online. When you log back in, you can continue with your application from the last completed page.

If you need more help with our Online Services, contact us