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Where is their evidence

Debt amount: 
$1400
Date debt issued: 
Wednesday, 23 May 2018
Period debt occurred: 
August 2013 to April 2014
Payment Type: 
Newstart Allowance
Appealing Debt?: 
Yes in process
Tell us about your debt and how has this affected you? e.g. anxiety levels, financial and accommodation stress: 

They say this debt occurred when I was working casually as a teacher. There are periods where I worked and earned good income, but then school holiday periods where I didn’t work and so had no income and got Newstart.

This debt saga has been going on for over a year. I keep asking for it to be reviewed but they come up with the same result. I asked for their evidence and cross referenced it with my payslips. I can’t see how the debt has been incurred as far as I can see I always over declared my income not under declared it.

At the start I kind of laughed that I had been “robo-debtted” thinking as soon as I explained the situation about holidays etc that it would be solved and repealed. But it has been going on for over a year. They continue to send me notices of “interest applied” which is incredibly stressful. The last appeal decision came 2 days after giving birth to my first child. I became so stressed that I hyperventilated on the phone to them, crying so much that my partner had to take over the conversation. I am so stressed that it won’t go away, and that they are now going to withhold my tax or maternity payments to recover the debt. I don’t know what I am going to do if they don’t give me my maternity payments as I can’t afford to stay home with my newborn without some income. A week after having the baby I had to go back to hospital because my blood pressure was so high. The stress of this so called debt looming over me does not help. Neither does the fact that I have to keep repeating being put on hold and repeating myself everytime I call them.

How do you feel about the way the Government has handled this process?: 

This is ridiculous. Today a lady told me that it was my responsibility to keep calling centerlink to find out if they need extra information or to check on my review. She also told me I have to set up a payment plan. I told her I have a new born and that I am on maternity leave and I don’t believe I owe them anything. She said “oh your in maternity leave you have time to call every 2 weeks then”. Clearly she has no idea what it is like to have a newborn! How am I meant to find an hour every fortnight to repeat myself to another person.

I asked to have a meeting at my local centerlink office to go through it in person, but apparently that isn’t an option as the staff in the offices are not trained in debt recovery.

This is ridiculous so now I have to keep fighting, and dealing with someone on the phone rather than a person who sees me as a person who is now highly stressed and anxious :(