The Child Support Maintenance Calculation Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2012

CHAPTER 2 N.I. REVISION

Grounds for revision N.I.

14.—(1) A decision to which Article 18(1A)(1) applies may be revised by the Department—

(a) if the Department receives an application for the revision of a decision either—

(i) under Article 18, or

(ii) by way of application under Article 28G,

within 30 days after the date of notification of the decision or within such longer time as may be allowed under regulation 15;

(b) if the Department is satisfied that the decision was wrong due to a misrepresentation of, or failure to disclose, a material fact and that decision was more advantageous to the person who misrepresented or failed to disclose that fact than it would have been but for the wrongness of the decision;

(c) if an appeal is made under Article 22(2) against a decision within the time limit prescribed by the Social Security and Child Support (Decisions and Appeals) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999(3) but that appeal has not been determined;

(d) if the Department commences action leading to the revision of the decision within 30 days after the date of notification of the decision;

(e) if the decision arose from official error;

(f) if the information held by HMRC in relation to a tax year in respect of which the Department has determined historic income for the purposes of regulation 34 or unearned income for the purposes of regulation 68 has since been amended; or

(g) if the ground for revision is that a person with respect to whom a maintenance calculation was made was not, at the time the calculation was made, a parent of a child to whom the calculation relates.

(2) A decision may not be revised because of a change of circumstances that occurred since the decision had effect or is expected to occur.

(3) An interim maintenance decision or default maintenance decision made under Article 14 may be revised at any time.

(4) In paragraph (1)(e) “official error” means an error made by an officer of the Department or HMRC acting as such to which no person outside the Department or HMRC materially contributed, but excludes any error of law which is shown to have been an error by virtue of a subsequent decision of a Child Support Commissioner or a court.

Commencement Information

I1 Reg. 14 comes into force in accordance with reg. 1

Late application for a revision N.I.

15.—(1) The time limit for making an application for a revision specified in regulation 14(1)(a) may be extended where the conditions specified in the following provisions of this regulation are satisfied.

(2) An application for an extension of time must be made by one of the parties or that party’s authorised representative.

(3) An application for an extension of time must contain particulars of the grounds on which the extension is sought and must contain sufficient details of the decision which it is sought to have revised to enable that decision to be identified.

(4) An application for an extension of time may not be granted unless the applicant satisfies the Department that—

(a) it is reasonable to grant the application;

(b) the application for revision has merit; and

(c) special circumstances are relevant to the application and because of those special circumstances it was not practicable for the application to be made within the time limit specified in regulation 14(1)(a).

(5) In determining whether it is reasonable to grant an application for an extension of time, the Department must have regard to the principle that the greater the amount of time that has elapsed between the end of the time specified in regulation 14(1)(a) for applying for a revision and the making of the application for an extension of time, the more compelling should be the special circumstances on which the application is based.

(6) In determining whether it is reasonable to grant the application for an extension of time, no account shall be taken of the following—

(a) that the applicant, or any person acting for the applicant, was unaware of or misunderstood the law applicable to the case (including ignorance or misunderstanding of the time limits imposed by these Regulations); or

(b) that a Child Support Commissioner or a court has taken a different view of the law from that previously understood and applied.

(7) An application under this regulation for an extension of time which has been refused may not be renewed.

(8) In paragraph (6)(b) the reference to a Child Support Commissioner shall be read as including a reference to the Upper Tribunal established under section 3 of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007(4).

Commencement Information

I2 Reg. 15 comes into force in accordance with reg. 1

Effective date of a revision N.I.

16.  Where a decision is revised and the date from which the original decision took effect is found to be wrong, the decision as revised takes effect from the date on which the original decision would have taken effect had the error not been made.

Commencement Information

I3 Reg. 16 comes into force in accordance with reg. 1

(1)

Paragraph (1A) was inserted by section 8(3) of the Child Support, Pensions and Social Security Act (Northern Ireland) 2000 and amended by Schedule 5 to the Child Maintenance Act (Northern Ireland) 2008

(2)

Article 22 is substituted by Article 42 of the Social Security (Northern Ireland) Order 1998 and section 10 of the Child Support, Pensions and Social Security Act (Northern Ireland) 2000 and amended by Schedule 5 to the Child Maintenance Act (Northern Ireland) 2008

(3)

S.R. 1999 No. 162

(4)

2007 c. 15