All successful relationships rely on give and take. It’s necessary in marriage, business and with any financial service relationships. And, with 70% of older Australians on an Age Pension. You would also expect it to work well with Centrelink, the agency that manages Age Pension entitlements for about 70% of retirees.
Sure, you think. But theory is a wonderful thing and reality can be different.
The Robodebt debacle occurred between 2015 and 2019 when around half a million incorrect ‘debts’ to Centrelink were pursued using a method called ‘income averaging’. According to the subsequent royal commission into this method of questionable debt recovery, the system was ‘unlawful, cruel and a failure of public service accountability’. This failure has severely damaged Centrelink’s reputation. It has also eroded the trust that many older Australians had in in the belief they would get a ‘fair go’ in their dealings with this government agency.
Robodebt has been back in the news in recent weeks as the book written about this episode, Mean Streak by Rick Morton, has just won the Prime Minister’s Literary award for non-fiction. And a two-part documentary on how this punitive program was rolled out, The People vs Robodebt, is screening on SBS (and available to watch on SBS on Demand).
Given the level of distress and concern caused by this chapter in Australian social benefits, we thought it timely to revisit the topic of your rights and Centrelink.
What are your rights?
What can you do
What can Centrelink do
We asked these questions of Steven Sadler who heads up the Retirement Essentials Customer Services Team. No one knows this detail like Guru Steven, so here is an edited overview of his wisdom.
