If you don't know who the father is

[Amity]

She can compel both of them to take a test. It usually requires a court order if they refuse to undertake one voluntarily. The cost (at VIFM I think) is $550.

She should check with Legal Aid as to how to go about it.

[fromscratch]

You are not required to put down a fathers name on the birth certificate in Victoria.
But not putting down a name also means no child support.
If your friend intends to collect a parenting payment then she only needs to declare that she is unsure who the father is. Unless things have changed over the last few years of course. My girlfriend was in a similar situation a few years back in Victoria. She collected Parenting payment and was made exempt for collecting child support and was given an allowance of sorts to compensate for the lack of child support. I don't know how much though.
She did tell centerlink that she didn't know who the possable fathers names were at the time. And I'm sure thats why she was made exempt.

[glenny_c]

Thank you.

And thank you for your non-judgemental answers. This is a tough time

[megs]

I would get her to ring and check, I now Centrelink has become a lot tougher on people trying to get exemptions from Collecting Child Support and they have changed the processes regarding the father unknown situations.

I think I would be encouraging her to ring Centrelink and ask the procedures, sometimes not collecting Child Support then impacts on your FTB rates.