Primary Health Care

Zero Fees for Under 6s

Additional payment available from 1 January 2008

An additional payment will be available from 1 January 2008 to practices that commit each quarter to providing free standard consultations to children under six. It is a voluntary opt on (and opt off) scheme similar to the Very Low Cost Access initiative.

The Under 6s initiative is designed to support more practices to provide free primary health care to children under six. This initiative will also provide greater certainty to families of young children that free primary health care for under sixes will be available in their community.

Eligibility criteria

Eligibility for the Under 6s payment will be limited to practices that commit each quarter to providing free standard consultations to children under six.

As well, practices must belong to a Primary Health Organisation (PHO) that:

is participating in the PHO Performance Programme and
has entered into the most current version of the PHO Agreement (where a variation to that Agreement has been made during a payment quarter, the PHO must have entered into the most current version of that Agreement by a date determined by the DHB).

Those practices receiving a Very Low Cost Access payment cannot receive an Under 6s payment as well.

How do practices apply?

For practices to receive the Under 6s payment PHOs must notify the DHB of their Under 6s practices each quarter. The notification dates for 2008/09 are provided below.

Payment quarter	Last date for PHOs to notify the DHB	Last date for the DHB to notify the Ministry
1 July 2008 – 30 September 2008	7 June 2008	14 June 2008
1October 2008 – 31 December 2008	7 September 2008	14 September 2008
1 January 2009 – 31 March 2009	7 December 2008	14 December 2008

The value of the Under 6s payment

From 1 July 2008, the Under 6s payment will represent a 16 percent premium on the First Contact capitation Access Non High Use Health Card rates. The rate tables for the Under 6’s payment are found via the link below. Because of system constraints it is not possible to create a separate capitation age band for 5 year olds only. Instead, as 5 year olds account for 10 percent of 5-14 year olds, the 15 percent Under 6s payment is spread across the whole 5-14 age group at 10 percent of its value.

Zero Fees for Under Six Year Olds Payment Table.

Maintaining value over time

As the Under 6s payment will be calculated as a percentage of the First Contact funding, the value of the Under 6s payment will be adjusted annually in line with the adjusted base.

Page last updated: 22 July 2008