u/Due-Maintenance5836

Centrelink Debt

I received a call today stating that I owe centrelink $1700 due to them overpaying me

This happened on the transition from youth allowance to parenting payment.

When I applied for the parenting payment I asked if I would need to cancel my youth allowance to which I was told no and that they do it automatically. Perfect.

So my youth allowance was cancelled from the 16th of Feb but nobody told me this until I received a letter on the 26th of March saying it’d been cancelled. I was paid two more payments from youth allowance (the 3rd of March and the 17th of March) these payments were after it’d been cancelled but before I received my letter so I was not aware that I shouldn’t have received them.

Do I have a chance of having this debt waived?

as I’ve read that it is possible so long as it was a mistake on centrelinks behalf and I was in “good faith”

Which I was and I have proof of not receiving the cancellation letter until the 26th of March.

I know it’s not a massive debt but I’m barely getting enough from centrelink now to get by as it is

and I’m just feeling a little gobsmacked as this was not my mistake.

Has anyone else experienced something like this and had it successfully waived?

Edit/ My parenting payment was not approved until the 27th of March and payments started the following week, so in no way was I receiving both payments at the same time.

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u/Due-Maintenance5836 — 6 days ago