Child Care Benefits.... means tested?

[thepixie]

Hi folks, sorry if this is the wrong place, mods feel free to move if need be.
I am most likely going to be starting work soonish and will have to put DD in childcare. I am pretty clueless about CCB and CCTR - well make that completely clueless. I think CCB is the one that reduces your fees by about half. My question is that I thought I heard somewhere that it was means-tested. If so, I am worried that we may miss out and the cost of putting her in care might cancel out any real benefit from working.
Can someone enlighten me?

[briggsy's girl]

ccb is means tested - if you have an income over a certain threshold you'll get no reduction to your weekly child care costs BUT - if you'r both working, CCTR will be paid quarterly, is not means tested, and pays you half of your out of pocket expenses to a max of about 7k per annum

[thepixie]

Do you know what the threshold is BG? And I assume its based on the family's income?
(and thanks for the quick reply, big for your cr*ppy day)

[briggsy's girl]

ummm, not sure exactly for this year - if you jump on the c'link website (centrelink.gov.au) go to online services, and choose to do the family assistance estimator - it will tell you your ccb entitlement in there. that then becomes a percentage of the basic amount (about 3.50) - so it's not a percentage of your total fees, just of that basic hourly rate

HTH