When a student applies for a VET Student Loan, they need to supply a valid Tax File Number (TFN). They supply this through the electronic Commonwealth Assistance Form (eCAF).
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If they don’t supply one, they won’t be able to get a VET Student Loan for that study period. You won’t be able to get a TFN on behalf of a student.
If there is no TFN on the student’s eCAF, you will not be paid the loan amount, and you cannot recover the course fee from students. You cannot recover course fees from the student where those fees were indicated in the Statement of Covered Fees [part 43.1] as being covered by a loan.
Students must enter their TFN in their eCAF by the first census day [part 26]. If the student has applied for a TFN but not received it in time, they will need a Certificate of Application for a Tax File Number.
You must make sure that the student’s personal details - name, date of birth and address - on the TFN application are exactly the same as those on the enrolment application.
Note: The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) will not provide TFNs to providers.
Neither the Act nor the Rules enable you to access a student’s TFN directly from the ATO. You must have regard to the rules, processes, procedures and penalties regarding handling of TFNs.
You can monitor that your students are entering valid TFNs into eCAF, but you will not be able to view the TFN in eCAF.
If a student needs to update their TFN, follow the usual business process of putting their eCAF application into ‘revision status’. This will send a notification to the student to update their TFN in eCAF.
As per your obligations, do not request or collect TFNs from students (even if the student gives you permission to do so).
Do not disclose student TFNs (even if the student gives you permission to do so).
30.1 - Applying for a TFN
Students need to apply for a TFN online from the ATO.
If a student has a TFN but can’t remember it, they should contact the ATO. The ATO won’t:
- tell the student their TFN over the phone
- give you a student’s TFN.
30.2 - Student doesn’t have a TFN by census day
A TFN is usually provided within 28 days of application to the ATO.
If a student does not receive their TFN before the relevant census day, they should provide you with:
- a Certificate of application for a TFN issued by the ATO or
- a copy of their online application summary and barcode matched receipt issued by Australia Post.
The student should provide this certificate or receipt to you as proof of having applied so you may monitor subsequent provision of the TFN.
If a student does not give a TFN in their initial VSL application, they will still be able to submit the eCAF for a VET Student Loan by uploading their Certificate of Application for a TFN.
It is important you advise students that even though they have uploaded a Certificate of application for a TFN into eCAF, they must still complete their eCAF with the TFN as soon as they receive it from the ATO.
You can run an eCAF exception report to identify students who have only supplied a Certificate of Application for a Tax File Number but not yet supplied a TFN. The report is available on the eCAF dashboard.
You may also search for eCAFs without TFNs directly in the eCAF system or via the API links from your student management systems.
If the eCAF does not have either the TFN or Certificate of Application for a TFN uploaded, the student will not be able to submit it. The student will need to pay for their studies upfront or alter their study plans.
30.3 - Adding the TFN to eCAF
Once a student has their TFN, they will need to upload it to the eCAF. You will need to re-open the eCAF to allow the student to update their TFN.
You can do this by putting the eCAF into ‘revision status’. The eCAF system will send an email to the student indicating they can update their eCAF record with their TFN. The student resubmits the eCAF after entering their TFN.
The student must do this within 6 weeks of the first census day included in the eCAF.
See the eCAF User Guide for more information about this process.
30.4 - Verifying Tax File Numbers
When you submit a student's VETSL debt record in TCSI, TCSI will conduct a daily check for any verified TFNs in eCAF and transfer the TFN to the corresponding student record in TCSI where the student’s TFN and personal details match.
Given the requirement for an exact match between TCSI and eCAF, you should ensure that student data is the same in both systems. If a match cannot be found and the TFN is not reported by the due date, the following TCSI notification will be presented to you:
A TFN cannot be found for the student. Please ensure there is a verified TFN and USI in eCAF, and the provider student ID, USI, and date of birth data in TCSI exactly matches that in the student’s eCAF.
When the TFN is transferred to the student record in TCSI it will be automatically sent for verification (by the ATO) and the following TCSI notification will be presented to you where the TFN does not verify.
The ATO cannot verify the TFN in TCSI even though it was verified in the eCAF. Please ensure that the provider student ID, USI, date and name details in TCSI exactly matches that in the student’s eCAF. If all the data match, and this notification still exists after a day, please contact TCSI Support.
If your student management system requires a TFN to report an eCAF to TCSI, you may need to make changes to your system or processes.
If you report a TFN to TCSI, TCSI will return the following warning message:
TFNs are no longer reportable by VET providers. This warning message will not prevent other changes in the request from being actioned, however the requested change to the Tax File Number (E416) has been ignored by the TCSI system.
TFN verification ensures each TFN is confirmed as belonging to a particular student before their associated VETSL debt is accepted by the ATO. The ATO verifies the TFNs by matching the details it has for the student with those the provider has reported to TCSI.
More information relating to the verification of TFNs can be found on TCSI Support.
30.5 - Tax File Number mismatch and troubleshooting
If a student's TFN cannot be matched, you will receive an automated email to advise that the TFN verification has failed and the debt will not be sent to the ATO.
You can find the details of the failed records in your TFN Verification reports in TCSI Analytics. Also, provider payment reports will show where TFN verification has failed. Information about this TCSI Analytics report can be found at Provider Notifications | TCSI Support.
Note: The TFN needs to be entered into both the eCAF and TCSI systems. If the TFN does not match in both systems, or is only entered in one system, the TFN verification will fail.
A student cannot use anyone else’s TFN when applying for VSL.
Legislation: Act s 20(a) and s 56.