I'm so sorry to hear that, Asher. Living with any sort of chronic illness is difficult enough, without having this sort of thing happen (twice). I would have thought they'd 'fast track' your son after making two stuff ups

I don't think they have a fast track! I was in the UK for 7 months trying to sort everything out it's a total mess!


Have you put in a complaint yet?

Sounds absolutely horrible asher. There must be a track called 'perhaps, maybe, in the fullness of time - if we feel like it'.

Yes, sent a written complaint today. It will be interesting to see the response and they needn't try to 'corporate speak' me out of existence. After 15 years in local government, I'm fluent in corporate speak

glad to hear they can't corporate flummery you let us know what the answer is, if it's anything like the psychs it will be;
yes we did wrong,
yes we are sorry and it wont happen again,
but no we will sort it out now for you part to it.

good luck x

Thanks asher, and all who sent messages

No, no admitting of any wrongdoing, bless their collective little cotton socks.

I eventually received the health care card. My husband didn't, as they 'mislaid' his application. Which I think's pretty clever, because it was on the same form as mine. Anyway, he's been added to mine now.

They finally sent me copies of the correspondence they'd sent to my previous address, and my ex has had access to some personal information about me, health as well as financial stuff. He doesn't know where I live though, so that's good.

After three lengthy paragraphs telling me how seriously they take people's privacy blah blah blah, they told me that they were referring my complaint to their - wait for it - Privacy and Secrecy Branch for review. That was 6 weeks ago and I've heard nothing about the outcome of the review - perhaps it's a secret

They're not off the hook yet

thank goodness he didn't get your address!

I love the title privacy and secrecy branch
I wonder if they are allowed to tell people where they work

make em grovel

After sellling a house recently got a pile of forms regarding PPR and land tax. I know from the valuations on the property no land tax is due. Yet state revenue want 6 years of documentation re when it was rented etc, info they already have from the bloody tax returns, like all govt depts they info share.

Nice to do hours of work to show them info they already have

I finally received a letter from the secret squirrel branch, which said that the result of their investigation is that Centrelink's actions were a breach of my privacy and a breach of the Privacy Act.

I'm not going to take them up on the offer to take it further (Ombudsman), as long as my complaint highlighted some shortcomings, and the relevant staff are more careful in future, then I'm happy.

Hopefully they'll improve things in the future - and lucky your address didn't get to your ex

good for you, I'm glad you decided to take it further breaches like these are worrying for all of us