Recalled payments not received by Services Australia 107-04010130

The Request for Refund letter sent to the financial institution provides 2 options to return the funds:

• Direct credit into:
• BSB: 092002
• Account No: 21951-6 (the Centrelink RBA GDES returns account)
• refer to Treasury Helpdesk
• Bank cheque - processed by the Debt Finance Team

Treasury reconcile the Government Direct Entry Service (GDES) bank account on a daily basis. This includes returning the payment/s to the customer record. Returned payment appear on the Payment Summary (PS) screen as RTN (Returned).

If the payment is not received, it may be because the payment:

• has not been returned to Services Australia at all, or
• was sent by the financial institution without enough details to match it to the correct customer record. For example, CRN, payment reference

Payment returns to the partner agency normally occur when the CRN is incomplete or missing. The agency sends a trace request to the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) for further details. Returned payments appear on a spreadsheet of 'outstanding' payments.

There is a daily sweep of the GDES returns bank account. This ensures the account has a zero balance at close of business.

Treasury can allocate the funds to the correct customer record in most cases once RBA provide the:

• date
• amount, and/or
• revised CRN of the missing payment

It is more difficult to locate payments sent with an incorrect (someone else's) CRN. Investigating these cases is not the role of Treasury.

It is not possible for Treasury to search every payment, on any given day. There are about 600 to 1,000 returns processed to the RBA GDES bank account daily. This volume of transactions (with minimal details provided) is too large for Treasury to review. Searching for a specific return is difficult because payment amounts are often common.

Payments are separated into payment types and environments. As exact date and payment reference makes searching much easier. For example, a full payment reference looks like this JR1S1357111222333C - (available on the customer's record)

• JR: Benefit type
• S: Environment
• 1357: Payment number
• CRN: 111222333C

Note: the first 3 components above make up the payment reference number. This is on the right hand side of the screen when selecting (S) the payment in the customer's record.

Refer enquiries about payments returned by cheque to the Debt Finance Team for follow up.

Confirm the cheque has been banked before referring to the Debt Finance Team.

The Debt Finance Team do not hold cheques for more than 7 days, with most being banked within 24 hours. Cheques can take longer to reach the Debt Finance Team if not sent to Locked Bag 33. Allow 2 weeks from posting of the cheque before sending 'missing cheque' enquiries to the Debt Finance Team. The Debt Finance Team respond to any enquiry within 2 working days.

CCS request for refunds are completed manually. See Reissue a payment at a customer's request.