Self-Employed

The easiest way to keep track of your Service in real-time is by logging in to the LeavePlus portal. Your Service record will be updated every time you pay your quarterly Long Service Leave Charges. You can also check the amount of Long Service Leave Benefit you have built up by viewing the ‘Entitlement’ screen in the LeavePlus portal.

Each year, LeavePlus generates your annual Statement of Service which details the total Service you have built up with LeavePlus as well as a breakdown of any Service you had built up in the previous financial year.

You may have built up Service with LeavePlus previously as a Worker or Apprentice. While employed by a business as a Worker or Apprentice, your Employer is required to report your Service to LeavePlus on quarterly returns.

Any Service that you have built up as a Worker or Apprentice can be used along with the Service you build up as a self-employed Working Subcontractor in Victoria. When you have built up a total of 7 years of continuous service and have notified LeavePlus of your intention to take long service leave, you will be eligible to claim a Long Service Leave Benefit.

Visit our Workers Building up service page and our Claiming Long Service Leave Benefits page.

The National Reciprocal Agreement means that if you were employed as a Worker and worked interstate, that time in the industry may be recognised alongside your Service accrued under the LeavePlus Scheme. However, you must notify and register with the relevant long service leave scheme in each state or territory that you work in. Visit the Interstate Schemes page for contact details.

It is also important that you notify LeavePlus when you are working interstate, so that our records note that you are operating your business outside of Victoria. Your record of Service in the industry is kept separately with each State/Territory scheme. When you make a claim for

Long Service Leave Benefits, we can contact the relevant interstate scheme(s) to confirm your Service recorded in that state/territory. Please remember to notify interstate schemes and LeavePlus of any change of address.

Can I roll my interstate service together?

No. The record for any Service accrued in a certain state or territory can only be recorded with the Long Service Leave authority in the state or territory in which the work was performed i.e. LeavePlus can only keep record of your work performed in Victoria. You cannot transfer any interstate record onto your record with us.

However, your Service recorded interstate can count towards your eligibility for a Long Service Leave Benefit. When you make a claim for a Long Service Leave Benefit, you can ask LeavePlus to count your interstate service in assessing your Long Service Leave Benefit in Victoria. Simply complete the interstate section of the claim form for your current host state, and any interstate entitlements can be paid out to you as part of your claim.

*The ‘Host state’ is the scheme that is responsible for processing your request for a Long Service Leave Benefit.

You can have breaks from recorded Service for a maximum of up to 4 years. As long as your Service record has gaps of no more than 4 years, you can build up on top of your previously accrued Service credits as one continuous Service record.

However, if you have a gap in Service of more than 4 years, your previous Service record will be made inactive and will not count towards your eligibility for a Long Service Leave Benefit as the gap in service is too large for there to be continuous Service as required under the Scheme Rules. If you had already accrued an entitlement to a Long Service Leave Benefit from your previous Service this will still be claimable.

If you were a non-contributing Working Subcontractor during a Break in Service period, you can provide LeavePlus with evidence that you were still in the industry at that time by sending us a copy of the taxable income page of your tax return for that year (showing your ABN, work type, and total financial income for that financial year). As long as this evidence shows you were contracting in Victoria during this time, with gaps of no more than 4 years between this evidence and your recorded service credits, then we can apply an Approved Break in Service to your account, whereby your Service will be classed as one continuous block (provided the evidence is not prior to 1 Dec 1997).

Service as a Working Subcontractor cannot be backdated. As contributions are optional for Working Subcontractors, if you did not contribute at the time, you will not accrue any Service for that time.

Working Subcontractors are eligible to start receiving service credits from the date on which they commence paying Long Service Leave Charges. There are two different calculations for accruing Service, dependent on when your Service was performed:

• Service accrued prior to 1 July 2002 is based on an accrual of 0.866 weeks of long service leave per full year of accrued Service (equivalent to 13 weeks after 15 years’ Service)
• Service accrued after 1 July 2002 is based on an accrual of 1.3 weeks of long service leave per full year of accrued Service (equivalent to 13 weeks after 10 years’ Service).