§ 303.2 - Establishment of cases and maintenance of case records.

§ 303.2 Establishment of cases and maintenance of case records.

(a) The IV-D agency must:

(1) Make applications for child support services readily accessible to the public;

(2) When an individual requests an application for IV-D services, provide an application to the individual on the day the individual makes a request in person, or send an application to the individual within no more than 5 working days of a request received by telephone or in a record. Information describing available services, the individual's rights and responsibilities, and the State's fees, cost recovery and distribution policies must accompany all applications for services and must be provided to title IV-A, Medicaid and title IV-E foster care applicants or recipients within no more than 5 working days of referral to the IV-D agency; and

(3) Accept an application as filed on the day it and the application fee are received. An application is a record that is provided or used by the State which indicates that the individual is applying for child support enforcement services under the State's title IV-D program and is signed, electronically or otherwise, by the individual applying for IV-D services.

(b) For all cases referred to the IV-D agency or applying for services under § 302.33 of this chapter, the IV-D agency must, within no more than 20 calendar days of receipt of referral of a case or filing of an application for services under § 302.33, open a case by establishing a case record and, based on an assessment of the case to determine necessary action:

(1) Solicit necessary and relevant information from the custodial parent and other relevant sources and initiate verification of information, if appropriate; and

(2) If there is inadequate location information to proceed with the case, request additional information or refer the case for further location attempts, as specified in § 303.3.

(c) The case record must be supplemented with all information and documents pertaining to the case, as well as all relevant facts, dates, actions taken, contacts made and results in a case.

[54 FR 32309, Aug. 4, 1989, as amended at 81 FR 93563, Dec. 20, 2016]