This page relates to the 2021-24 National Land Transport Programme.
This page describes the process for claiming funding assistance for approved activities managed and delivered by approved organisations.
Waka Kotahi activities are subject to the same criteria, except that the process involves Waka Kotahi (for its own activities) determining accrued expenditure based on certified invoices, certificates of work done or progress reports, and directly paying contractors, consultants and other service providers. Payments are made via Waka Kotahi finance systems and actual spend is uploaded to Transport Investment Online (TIO) during end-of-year processing.
Every approved organisation must operate a land transport disbursement account in accordance with section 24 of the Land Transport Management Act 2003.
Land Transport Management Act 2003 s24(external link)
Approved organisations must claim funding assistance from the National Land Transport Fund (NLTF) via TIO. See the claims user manual within TIO for details on how to create and submit a claim.
Transport Investment Online(external link)
We (Waka Kotahi as investor) expect that approved organisations will:
Unless we specifically require otherwise, payment of funding assistance is dependent on the person that certifies the claim accepting responsibility for the appropriateness of design and construction/implementation procedures, and the quality of materials used.
For approved organisations, the value of work claimed must be certified by the organisation’s chief executive or approved delegate in TIO when the claim is submitted. While it is not necessary to hold a supporting invoice at the time of the claim, all amounts claimed must be supported by appropriate evidence in the form of certificates of the value of work done or progress reports certified by the chief executive or an approved delegate. Supporting evidence is to be held within the organisation’s records.
The certification of the claim will be taken to certify that the works were undertaken to a standard fit for their intended purpose.
The Public Finance Act 1989, section 76, provides for the imposition of penalties on persons who give false certificates for the purpose of procuring for any programming organisation the improper payment of any public money.
Public Finance Act 1989 s76(external link)
Submitted claims are authorised by our regional representative and will be paid within 10 days of submission, unless we exercise our right to defer payment of June/July claims as set out below.
As set out in the National Land Transport Fund investment claims and obligation policy, we reserve the right to defer June/July payments in any year of those approved organisations where claims exceed 15% of their annual claims in their June/July claims. Application of these terms of trade will take into account any special requests by us on specific approved organisations to make late claims.
National Land Transport Fund investment claims and obligation policy
Note that Waka Kotahi may reduce, refuse, or withhold payments in certain cases as set out in the Land Transport Management Act 2003, section 36.
Land Transport Management Act 2003 s 36(external link)
If an approved project has an allocation in the following year but work has been advanced:
Claimed expenditure on works in a previous financial year does not qualify for funding assistance in a subsequent year, except for:
A supplementary allocation is an increase in allocation for a stand-alone activity provided at the end of the financial year once the out-turn expenditure for that activity is known, and where it exceeds the current approved allocation.
Note that end of year increases for 3-year funded programmes must be processed as cashflows from the following year. If the increase is in the final year of an NLTP, then an increase will not be authorised and the claim should be held back until the following NLTP funds have been approved.
All supplementary requests are to be entered as cashflow advances except that, if insufficient allocation exists in forward years, the request should be for a cost/scope adjustment. If the increase is less than $50,000 (total cost for approval) and spend is complete, a formal request is not required and the investment advisor only needs to add a recommendation to TIO. Requests over $50,000 will be subject to the normal cost increase process.
Funding approvals and funding variation process [PDF, 514 KB]
A claim for the supplementary amount must be submitted as soon as the supplementary allocation is approved.
Final claims are those for payment of the cost of activities completed to 30 June within the approved allocation.
Final claims, including supplementary allocations, must be based on actual expenditure and must be made by the 10th working day in July, when the Waka Kotahi finance system closes. To achieve this, the following tasks and dates are important:
We will undertake periodic audits of selected claims. See the section on monitoring, reporting and assurance on this knowledge base for more detail.
2021-24 NLTP monitoring, reporting and assurance
Our regional staff will regularly monitor the status of claims submitted and may ask to check the balance in the land transport disbursement account to ensure that large credit balances are not being held. An investment audit automatically follows in any case reported to us by the Office of the Controller and Auditor-General.
Over-claims become a debt due to the Crown immediately upon establishment of the debt.
Where funds have to be repaid to the NLTP, either due to overclaiming or property settlements, these should always be set up in TIO and added to the next claim. The approved organisation’s investment advisor can provide guidance on how to do this for the particular scenario.
