The paperwork after the birth

The short answer

Three jobs have a deadline.

• Register the birth with your state or territory registry. Most places give you 60 days. The ACT gives you 6 months.
• Enrol your baby in Medicare. Use the signed form from the hospital pack.
• Claim Parental Leave Pay and Family Tax Benefit. The first parent to claim for a child has 52 weeks from the birth.

One more, and it happens before the birth. Give your employer at least 10 weeks' written notice before your leave starts.

What can be out of date here

Payment rates, registry fees and day counts move on 1 July each year. Every figure below was checked on 15 October 2026. Before you act on a deadline or a dollar figure, check it on the day with whoever you are lodging it with — Services Australia, your employer or your state registry.

What you can do early

Most of the hard parts can be done while you are still waiting.

• Get your own Centrelink customer reference number. It is yours, not the baby's, and you cannot claim online without it. You can prove your identity and get it through myGov.
• Check whose Medicare card you are on. If you are still on your parents' card, you have to move to your own card before you can enrol your baby. People find this out on the day they try.
• Claim up to 3 months before the due date. Family Tax Benefit and Parental Leave Pay both take a pre-birth claim. You finish it off after the birth with proof of birth.
• Tell your employer. At least 10 weeks' written notice before your leave starts.

What to do, who with, and by when

Each job, in that order

Your own customer reference number

A customer reference number is how Centrelink knows who you are. It is yours. The baby does not get one from you.

If you have never dealt with Centrelink, you need this before you can claim anything online. You get it by proving your identity through myGov.

Do it before the birth. It is the step that stops everything else.

Your own Medicare card

You cannot enrol a baby on a card you are only listed on. If you are still on your parents' Medicare card, transfer to your own card first.

A child can be on at most two Medicare cards. To add them to the second parent's card, you use the form for copying or transferring a child between cards.

Written notice of your leave

Unpaid parental leave is a job entitlement. It comes from the Fair Work Act and it is separate from any Centrelink payment.

Give your employer at least 10 weeks' written notice before your leave starts. Say how much leave you want and the start and finish dates.

If 10 weeks is not possible, you do not lose the leave. Give notice as soon as you can, even if the leave has already started. Fair Work gives a premature birth as the example.

The pre-birth claim

You can claim Family Tax Benefit and Parental Leave Pay from 3 months before the due date. Nothing is paid before the birth. The claim just sits there waiting for proof of birth.

The Newborn Upfront Payment and Newborn Supplement need no separate claim. They are checked off the Family Tax Benefit claim, and the answer arrives as a letter in your myGov inbox.

Confirm your leave dates

At least 4 weeks before your leave starts, confirm the dates with your employer and tell them about any changes.

If you are taking part of the leave as single flexible days, those days need their own 4 weeks' notice on top.

Register the birth

This is the one with a legal deadline, and the deadline is set by your state or territory. The table below has all eight.

The hospital does not do it for you. The hospital tells the registry a baby was born, usually within a week, and your registration is matched against that notice. That is why dads think it is already done. It is not.

Registering is free. And if you do not register the birth, Services Australia may not be able to pay you.

The birth certificate

A certificate is a separate thing from registration. Registration is required and free. A certificate is optional, costs money, and cannot be ordered until the birth is registered.

Prices are in the state table below. You will want one eventually — passports and school enrolment need it — but nothing in the first weeks is waiting on it.

Enrol your baby in Medicare

The hospital or midwife gives you a Parent Pack. Inside it is a Newborn Child Declaration. A doctor or midwife has to sign the proof-of-birth declaration on the last page.

• That one form does four jobs. It is your proof of birth for Medicare, for both Centrelink claims, for My Health Record and for the Medicare Safety Net.
• It cannot be reissued if you lose it. Put it somewhere you will find it again.

Enrol as soon as you can. Past 52 weeks you need the birth certificate instead. The new card arrives in 3 to 4 weeks, and a digital version is there straight away in the myGov app.

If the form is lost

You can still prove the birth. Services Australia will take any one of three things.

A birth certificate or certified extract. Another Australian Government document showing the child's name and date of birth. Or a letter from the doctor or midwife who was there.

A letter has to carry your details, the child's name, date and place of birth, and the practitioner's signature, qualifications and registration number. Supporting documents do not have to be certified.

Finishing the Parental Leave Pay claim

Nothing is paid until you have claimed and handed over every supporting document, proof of birth included. Having registered the birth, or applied to register it, is a condition of the payment.

The first parent to claim for a child has 52 weeks from the birth. If the other parent has already claimed, a second claimant has 2 years, and all the days have to be used inside 2 years of the birth.

Finishing the Family Tax Benefit claim

Same window: within 52 weeks of the birth. A lump sum claim instead has to be in before 30 June of the next financial year.

You cannot get the Newborn Upfront Payment and Newborn Supplement for a child who is getting Parental Leave Pay. It is one or the other for that child. Which one is better depends on your household, and that is a question for Services Australia, not for us.

The Australian Immunisation Register

Nothing to do. Services Australia adds your baby to the register when it enrols them in Medicare. That is true on every route — through a family payment claim, through your Medicare online account, or off the Newborn Child Declaration.

To check it happened, get the immunisation history statement through your Medicare online account in myGov, or in the myGov app. A parent can get it for a child under 14. A vaccination provider can print it, and the register will post it, which takes up to 14 days.

My Health Record

Your baby gets a record either from the relevant questions on the Newborn Child Declaration, or when you register them while enrolling for Medicare. It is not automatic, and it is not a separate application.

The job that is left is getting access. You need a myGov account with My Health Record linked, your Medicare card number and your own reference number, and the baby's reference number. Those are the small numbers to the left of the names on the card.

Up to age 14 you are automatically an authorised representative, and both parents can be. The privacy setting starts on General Access, which means any healthcare provider can see every document. You can change it.

Private health cover

There is no national rule here. All you have to do is tell your insurer when your family circumstances change, and a newborn counts.

The window to add a baby, and whether cover is backdated to the birth, are set by your insurer. Ring them and ask those two questions by name. Do it before the birth if you can.

Birth registration, state by state

One source per row. There is no national deadline. Registration is free everywhere that states a position on it; the certificate is a separate purchase.

Six jurisdictions give you 60 days. The ACT gives you 6 months, and Tasmania does not publish a deadline at all. If you are in Tasmania, ring the registry and ask. We would rather say we do not know than print a number we could not find.

NSW adds something worth knowing if you are late: you can still register, and you will not get in trouble for it.

What this page does not do

It does not work out what you are entitled to. Eligibility depends on your income, your work history and your household, and only Services Australia can answer it.

It does not tell you what you will be paid. The daily rate changes every 1 July, and some days are reserved for the other parent.

It is not legal advice, and your award or agreement at work may give you more than the minimum.

Dadda's note

The paperwork was trivial. We just filled out the details in myGov. It took no time at all.

Also look at

• The third trimester stage page, for what to do before the birth
• The first three months stage page