I had a debt for failure to report, even though I was locked out for reporting. It was raised a year later without my knowledge. The first I knew was when debt collectors were calling me. This was quite disturbing and also time consuming to retract the debt. The debt however was completely covered by income credits.
Fast Forward to 2018 when I returned back to Australia only to have debt collectors calling me again. This time I had a debt raised for the same payment, same period regarding income (not failing to report) from the same job, same period of payment. I informed them of the previous correspondence in 2014, provided bank statements for the time, and was told someone would be in contact if there were issues.
I did not hear back until after I had left the country again. This had me quite anxious and annoyed as I then spent over 2 hours on the phone to be told "this is a separate issue, it is to do with income, not failing to report. I said the amount from the job at the time had been covered by income credits. The officer said they had no record of this correspondence, including the amount of work credits I had as it was in a different department, whom I have not been able to contact yet.
The money was recently taken out of my tax return, pending further review, which I intend to take up upon returning to Australia.
While financially I am better able to deal with this than other people affected by this issue, It has still caused stress, frustration and annoyance with having the burden of proof placed on me, and not being able to deal with one person on the issue.
Appallingly. To be told that the reason I had the debt was due to them having no information or record from their own department on the issue.