I returned to uni to study medicine after 10 years of full time work (and tax paying). I claimed Austudy in order to pay rent and eat. My situation was very complex and it took many hours of phone calls, centerlink visits to have my claim approved. I then ensure I reported every bit of income to them in order to avoid any issues like this. Just before Christmas I got a letter to confirm my employment income for 2014/15. Given that I started uni half way through that financial year when they spread my income over each fortnight they decided I was not eligible for any payments and they want it all back. This is despite me having earned nothing for up to 6 weeks at a time. The money allowed basic necessities but I there was nothing left to buy textbooks I would have liked and there was certainly nothing for hobbies or holidays. Despite knowing the debt is a mistake I have still felt anxious and preoccupied by the debt hanging over my head. I currently work 2 jobs, more than full time over the holidays trying to make enough money to survive the year. In 3 weeks I have to go back to full time uni, potentially with centrelink still wasting many hours of time I don't have.
So far I have spent around 2.5 hours on the phone to centrelink. This is in-between working full time. The first call the person at the other end was rude and treated me like I had tried to rip off centrelink. She would not in anyway acknowledge that this is a huge problem with many customers at the moment and explained why I owed money like I was thick. I made her talk me through how to report my income in 2 week blocks. Once I had done this I filled in what I could but then had to get a list of all of my income from my employer. Once I had the info I went back to edit it I no longer could. This resulted in another call, 1 hour on hold and then I got transferred. However I had been on hold so long it was after 5pm and I got hung up on. Next day I got onto someone who was lovely. Acknowledged there was a problem and told me how to fix it. I am still waiting for them to allow me to edit my income again but hopefully once I do it will be fixed. Centrelink is so hard to deal with that even though I qualify for a health care card I haven't bothered applying as it is not worth it.