Centrelink...wtf

Was talking to an old school mate. He said his parents were coming to stay here for 3-6 months or something. I asked why? He said they had to do it to continue claiming the pension and some other Centrelink benefits. His parents have millions in property overseas (one of them is a huge freaking shopping centre), don't even live in this country (apparently they can't stand it here) and never sold them when they immigrated over years ago and he joked at how broken the system was. I didn't see any humour in it. What type of ridiculous system is this - isn't the government able to check this stuff? My tax dollars is going to this rubbish.

 

They cracked down on a lot of OS retirees a few years back. From recollection if you are OS for more than 6 weeks at a time you lose your pension so their story doesn't quite make sense.
Previous to that you could pretty much spend a chunk of time like that in Oz and the rest of the time OS and get the pension.

 

All our tax dollars are.

 

They are supposed to declare their holdings overseas before claining such benefits. Its clearly asked for from what i know. Not doing so is a fairly big offence.

 

Even if they lived here, they would be able claim it though right (if they didn't declare), despite their vast holdings? Surely the govt. can find out? Don't all the developed nations (Korea, HK, US, UK etc) tend to share tax info and stuff at a Govt. level?

Christ this stuff annoys me.

 

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Yes esven if they are aust citizens living here, they must declare assets held overseas. It asks for it. Not doing so puts them at risk the govt finding out. the govt might not che k every laim, rather random and peridic audits. If/when they do find out overseas assets havnt been declared, thats when a lot of trouble starts.

 

I guess the only way to stop such unfairness is to dob them in?

 

What I mean is would an audit even find it? AND, why would you even need to do an audit. Surely it's easy for them to run electronic checks on everyone.

Just imagine the billions being blown because they only look into manually in a small number of cases. It would be worth investing in whatever tools are necessary to do this on a larger scale.

 

Nope that's not me. Plus it's a drop in the ocean. I'm more upset at the government than I am with them. This stuff needs to be done at a large scale.

 

Ever heard of 'Operation Wickenby'? How much larger do you want?

 

I agree. Govt could save billions of dollars a year if it thought about some of these things:
- PPOR included in assets test
- Overseas assets included in assets test

Meanwhile FIL who has worked all his life in Australia is not eligible for pension at all. Has assets but no Super as was self employed.

 

Not the same is it. Isn't this targeting illegal foreign investment here?

 

That's both the pension and centrelink right? Seems like such a quick win for both depts.

 

There is a dob in a welfare cheat line.

Heck they're getting feeds from multiple sources but for some reason, they still need to use RP to look things up for serious non-compliance

 

Strop, Hoges etc made their money here - it was just tax avoidance.

 

What about tenant applicants who are a definite couple, yet both on single parent benefits?

 

Wickenby targeted high net wealth individuals. If these people are claiming Centrelink they wouldn't ever be Wickenby targets.

It's a cumbersome, complex and incredibly time consuming process which is largely intelligence based, if no one tells centrelink, even anonymously, there's a good chance it will never be investigated.

 

Common Reporting Standard | Australian Taxation Office

I know this is tax related rather than centrelink, and bank accounts rather than property. however there is data sharing between agencies and I imagine some red flags that would indicate further investigation is warranted.

 

This drives me insane. My SIL is running a cleaning business, even has an employee now and has it all cash based so she stills gets full parenting payment. I'm pretty sure that's jail time if caught? Are people only caught if someone dobs them in?

 

Only if people with information like this report it - which you should do.