There are 2 possible final outcomes to your application for the Financial Assistance Scheme (FAS):
- Eligible application: The FAS will provide financial assistance.
- Ineligible application: The FAS will not provide financial assistance.
You will receive a notice of decision once an outcome has been reached about your application, including any decisions about interim assistance.
Before your final application outcome is decided, you may receive:
- Notice that your application is unlikely to be eligible: If your application is unlikely to be eligible, you will receive a notice asking you to address any issues identified or provide further details within the next 28 days.
- Notice of request for further information: This notification explains why there is insufficient information to make a decision about your application and requests further information. It gives you 28 days (which you can ask to be extended) to provide further information.
Decision-making process
After you submit your application, it goes through multiple stages until you receive your outcome.
First, we check if you are eligible for interim assistance. Interim assistance covers safety expenses, medical expenses and counselling costs. It supports you while your application is being assessed. Any interim assistance paid will be deducted from your final amount of assistance.
We then assess your application for a final outcome.
To make fair and consistent outcome decisions on payments, highly trained FAS staff use policies, checklists, guidelines and legislation to decide:
- when an application is complete (all the information required is in the application)
- (opens in a new window)eligibility(opens in a new window) as either a primary, secondary or related victim or eligibility for funeral expenses
- eligibility for different financial assistance types
- whether any decision made for interim assistance can be maintained following assessment of the FAS application and eligibility.
Notice of decision
The FAS will provide a written notice of decision once it considers an application.
The notice of decision will outline:
- the outcome of the decision (whether you are eligible for financial assistance)
- the reasons for the decision
- the amount the FAS will pay to you or a service provider (if a payment of assistance is being made)
- any conditions attached to the payment of assistance (if a payment of assistance is being made), and
- your right to an internal review.
Your notice of decision letter will also contain a link to a voluntary survey.
Use the survey to provide feedback so we can continue to improve the scheme and support victims of crime in Victoria.
How long will the decision-making process take?
We work as quickly as possible to process applications and make decisions on payments.
Each claim is unique. We handle all applications carefully so that you receive the assistance you’re entitled to.
It may take several months before we can make a final decision on your full application. Interim assistance applications are processed in significantly less time, to ensure we can provide support to victims of crime as soon as possible.
We know that waiting for your claim to be processed can be difficult and we want to let you know that we are processing all applications as quickly as we can.
To help us process your application faster, make sure you have all the correct documents and information available when you start your application. We will contact you if we require more information to process your application.
Any delay in processing your application will not affect the outcome of your claim.
You or your authorised representative can check the status of your claim at any time through the application portal.
Updated