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Showing posts with the label Centrelink

Contacting Centrelink

Various news outlets reported on the 11/1/17 that the human services minister, Alan Tudge, said “…I know that the call wait time for Centrelink can be long, the average call wait time at present is about 12 minutes…” and “People can also go to a Centrelink office and typically they’ll be able to see a person, in person, within 10 minutes.” Now this is a significantly different to that reported by Centrelink staff and that which has been presented at Senate enquiries. The Australian National Audit Office reported that in 2013-14 13.7 million callers hung up after waiting for as much as 1 hour. From all reports the current situation is now far worse; especially since the average age pension claim processing times have gone from an average 6 weeks to 4-5 months! Now let’s test those ‘access’ times. It’s unlikely to be statistically significant, but it may give an idea of how a ‘typical’ Centerlink recipient needs to handle the situation. We are going to work with an age pensione...

Couple with $53,000 pa in 2017?

Our most popular recent blog entries have been the articles relating to issues on: couple earning $53k pa - $32,718 pa in pension and $20,000 pa wages and other income. how much will I lose in 2017. periodic work and the the work bonus scheme  Age Pension Calculator and the Work Bonus Scheme Our Pension Calculator also includes an estimate of how much age pensioners may gain/lose come Jan 2017 - remembering that these changes are not grandfathered or tapered. So let’s combine all the above and update the situation whereby a home owning couple can have combined earnings of approx. $53,000 pa. Deemed Income  First though we should explain that with respect to deemed income: we are treating the deemed income as an estimate for actual income, as this is the same way that Centrelink does. You may be able to achieve higher rates than those deeming Centrelink rates. Equally you may achieve less. For example Centrelink will assume that you will earn more t...