Beneficiaries get paid their day

Beneficiary advocate Kay Brereton is very pleased to learn that Work and Income have changed their practice and are now correctly administering the legislation stating when to grant a person’s benefit after their stand-down ends.

“This is great news. People are now being paid from the day the law says, which is the day their stand down ends, not the day after,” Ms Bereton said.

“Although one day of benefit payment doesn’t seem like much money to those in regular full-time employment, when the benefit is your only income and you’ve had no money during the stand down, that extra day might be the difference between having food or going hungry that week.

“My hope is that now that Work and Income has changed their practice, the Minister will see no need to change the law to align with the old practice, and people will continue to be paid from the day their stand-down ends.

“That Work and Income are now paying people their day hopefully means that they intend to correct the mistake they had been making commencing benefits a day late since June 1998.

“I would like to see an automatic process where everyone that Work and Income has current details of is assessed and paid what they are owed as a result of the administrative error, and that only former clients would need to apply for a review to claim their day.

“Since the news came out about the administrative error, hundreds of people have applied to Work and Income for a review to be paid the days they are owed.

“For some people it is more than one day they are owed, those who have been in employment moving on and off benefit may be owed several days as there is a day for each time they had a stand-down.

“This is going to have a small but positive impact for those families struggling with the precarious employment market.”

ENDS

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