Date
13 March
31 March
31 March
31 March
31 March
Key Date or deadline
University Applications and Offers submission
Final date to report your Student Submissions and Student Revision
Submissions.
Remember this is the final transfer of 2014 data (including revisions to students’ debts) to the Australian Taxation Office.
2014 SA-HELP submission
2014 OS-HELP submission
2015 Commonwealth Scholarship – continuing students
Remember you can submit any time before the due date. Plan well!
Please don’t leave your submissions until the last day.
The key dates and reporting deadlines calendar lists all the dates you need to remember.

HEIMS Data Collections
Higher Education eNews
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March 2015
Thanks to everyone who completed our HEIMS Data Collections survey. What did we learn?
Our survey has given us a great opportunity to better understand what works best for you and how we can continue to improve our support and resources.
Every year we look for new and better ways to assist you in meeting your reporting obligations. 2014 was a big year for improvements to the HEIMSHELP website and our training.
The improved HEIMSHELP site search, powered by Google, has been a great success with a
67% increase in use of the search box in 2014.
Our webinars have been incredibly popular with 37 training sessions on 13 topics with a total of 1,896 attendees.
We have already commenced work in response to your comments and suggestions in our survey.
Many people use their phones to manage both personal and professional schedules. We have created a public Google calendar that you can access through your Google account and iCal. Subscribing to our calendars will allow you to receive notices through your calendar app of choice. We have also created .ICS files for import to Outlook. You can access these calendars via links on the HEIMSHELP Key Dates and Reporting Deadlines Calendars page.
We will be providing departmental, government and training calendars soon. We’ll let you know on the HEIMSHELP front page when they’re ready.
In response to your comments about downloading Scopes and Structures you may now download a package with all documents for each collection.
While our training webinars have proved very popular and convenient, many of you have requested that we increase group training in your states. We are currently looking for opportunities to provide more of these training sessions.
We have provided the results of the 2014 survey in a PowerPoint presentation. The presentation can be downloaded at the link below.
2014 HEIMS Client Support Services Survey Results
If you do not have MS PowerPoint available you may download a viewer from Microsoft. http://www.microsoft.com/en-au/download/details.aspx?id=13
Microsoft doesn’t provide a PowerPoint viewer for the current Mac operating system. If you use Mac then you may either install the viewer on the same machine as HEPCAT or view the
2014 Client Services Support Survey PDF . http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 2 -

HEIMS Data Collections
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Don't miss your last chance to send 2014 student debts and revisions to the ATO before tax time!
The final 2014 Student, OS-HELP, SA-HELP and Commonwealth Scholarship submissions are due on 31 March. Planning ahead and organising these submissions across the next couple of weeks will help to reduce the last minute workload for you at the end of the month.
This is also your last opportunity to report all students HELP debts and revisions to debts for 2014! In April we commence the final transfer of data to the ATO prior to the ATO’s issuing of notices of assessment for 2014-15.
Check out our new Reporting to the ATO page for all the timeframes and information you need on the reporting of HELP data to the ATO.
Remember the ATO no longer has an urgent manual revision process if you have late data to report.
Don’t forget that unit of study completions and course completions data are also due in
April. If you can report these submissions before you commence the verification of your
2014 data on 15 April you may also help to simplify your workload over the coming two months.
Check out our training sessions for March and April. Do you need more? Contact us!
Regular training on all reporting topics is available throughout the year. Check our training dates in March and April to see what sessions will most suit your needs.
We have organised our core training around each of the quarterly reporting dates so that all the information you need to meet each deadline will be readily available for you well before the due dates.
Our Getting Started sessions for new providers are available in the first week of each month throughout the year.
6 weeks before each reporting date you can attend our sessions on how to report your data using HEPCAT
Our sessions on understanding validations and simple strategies to resolve validation errors occur 4 weeks before each reporting date. http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 3 -

HEIMS Data Collections
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March 2015
We also offer individual training sessions, giving you an opportunity to work directly with our team. We plan these sessions around your needs; you can travel to Canberra and work with our team or we can set up a customised webinar for you if this is more convenient. You decide what works best for your organisation.
If you would like to organise a customised training session please contact us .
During the year we also provide special interest training sessions to address particular issues or to notify you of any impending changes or new functionality. Details of these training sessions are provided in our newsletters and will also be available from our training calendar.
The table below lists the training sessions planned for March and April. If you would like to attend any of these sessions you will need to click on the link to register.
Webinar Date and Time
3 March - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEDT
Register now
10 March - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEDT
Register now
12 March - 2.00 to 2.45pm AEDT
Register now
1 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEDT
Register now
7 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEST
Register now
9 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEST
Register now
14 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEST
Register now
15 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEST
Register now
Validating your data
Reporting – Getting Started
New Student Concordance submission
Reporting Completions data
Reviewing your reported data
Revising your data
Reporting - Getting Started
Simplifying Verification http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 4 -

Date and Time
20 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEST
Register now
22 April - 2.00 to 3.00pm AEST
Register now
HEIMS Data Collections
Higher Education eNews
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March 2015
Webinar
Reporting with HEPCAT Part 1
Reporting with HEPCAT Part 2
Are you reporting your overseas students’ fees correctly? How accurate is your data?
Three key issues are seriously affecting the quality and usability of the data reported to
HEIMS on overseas student fees. While there are some variations around these issues, they generally relate to:
 significant numbers of overseas students being reported with tuition fees of $0
 the reporting of the total fee more than once during the year, leading to excessively high fees that do not represent what a student was actually charged

Reporting the total fee for a course that is longer than one year in a single year, with no fee reported in subsequent years.
Please ensure that when you report your final 2014 submissions on 31 March your overseas student fees are correct for this year.
This will ensure the data you sign off in your verification reports, which is used for the higher education publications and time series reports, will be accurate and reliable.
Just under 30 percent of overseas higher education students are currently being reported with tuition fees of $0. This is an exceptionally high percentage given the small number of circumstances under the Higher Education Support Act 2003 in which a fee is not required.
Under the Act you must report the tuition fee for an overseas student for each year of their course. The only exceptions to this rule are overseas students who are not subject to the minimum indicative fee requirements ( Ch. 6 of the Higher Education Provider Guidelines ).
These students are:
 overseas students in a course of study for which the department has approved charges less than the minimum indicative fee
 overseas students undertaking study in Australia as part of a formal exchange programme, including research students under co tutelle arrangements http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 5 -

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 overseas students undertaking study in Australia towards a Research Master’s degree or a Research Doctoral degree who have been awarded a scholarship for that study on the basis of merit following a competitive process.
 overseas students undertaking study wholly off shore at an off shore campus of an
Australian Higher Education provider.
Please check that the only overseas students you have reported without a tuition fee meet one of these categories.
Tuition fees for overseas students are not reported in the same way as tuition fees for domestic students. Overseas fees are reported for a course for the year (Element 500) rather than as a fee for each unit of study.
You can report this fee in a way that best suits your administration processes. HEIMS will total all amounts reported on Element 500 for the year into a single total fee. As an example, if the total fee for a course for an overseas student in 2014 is $10,000, it can be reported as:
1.
as a single total amount of $10,000 once a year.
This can be reported in the first submisison of the year or at a time that best suits you. [In the other 2014 submissions for the student you would report a fee of $0].
2.
in instalments across the year.This may be:
 two half yearly instalments of $5,000 or
 four quarterly instalments of $2,500.
One reported amount of
$10,000
Two instalments of $5,000
Four instalments of
$2,500
In a similar way, if the student’s course is longer than a year their fees should be pro-rated across the length of the course. If for example, a student is charged a total fee of $15,000 for a 1.5 year course, the fee for the first year of study would be reported as $10,00 and $5,00 for the next half year componenet of the course. http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 6 -

HEIMS Data Collections
Higher Education eNews
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March 2015
Please remember that if you have made arrangements with a student that allows them to pay their fees through a payment plan that is a matter between your organisation and the student. It does not affect the total amount of the fee to be reported to the department.
You can view a complete list of the overseas student fees you have reported for 2014 in your
HEIMS Online Data View reports at any time throughout the year. You must also verify the accuracy of your data in this report twice a year during verification.
You can update your overseas student fees on Element 500 using the Student Enrolment
Revision submission at any time.
A new version of HEPCAT will be available on 5 March 2015. What's changed this time?
Please note that all HEIMS systems will be unavailable on 4 March for the new release to be migrated to production.
The key change in this release is the introduction of the Student Concordance submission.
The Student Concordance submission will enable you to link two Student Identification codes ( element 313 ) you have previously reported to HEIMS for the same student. Prior to this release student concordances could only be processed with assistance of the department.
You may notice some slight delays when opening HEPCAT for the first time after installing the new version, as your latest course data is copied from HEIMS to HEPCAT.
The other key HEPCAT changes in this release include:
1.
Validation 1314 on the Enrolment (EN) and VET Enrolment (VEN) files has been modified to correct a fault.
2.
Validation 7037 on the Load/Liability (LL) and Revised Load/Liability (RL) has been introduced to prevent domestic students being reported against overseas Student
Status codes ( element 490 )
Full details of all new HEPCAT and HEIMS functionality and a list of all new and updated validations, is in the release notes available on the Reporting with HEPCAT toolkit page.
Are you having difficulties installing the latest version of HEPCAT ? Our common issues page may help you resolve these issues. If you find that the issues are still occurring please contact our team for further assistance. http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 7 -

HEIMS Data Collections
Higher Education eNews
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March 2015
When a new version of HEPCAT is released we invariably receive calls from distressed providers who didn't back up their database prior to installation. Please remember:
 the department cannot replace your database if it is lost, deleted or corrupted. As we do not have access to your version of HEPCAT or the database on your computer we cannot replicate this for you.
 your data management processes should include regular back-ups of your HEPCAT database to protect against loss of data or system failure.
For information on backing up your database see part three of the HEPCAT user guide .
If you have a new student management system you need to let us know.
Take a look at our Changes to Student Administration systems on HEIMSHELP for more information. http://heimshelp.education.gov.au Page - 8 -