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Boat Harbour resident Marsha Ferris struggled with Centrelink for six months for a pension she was entitled to. Ms Ferris, who is diabetic, turned 65 in 2016 and applied for her aged pension in mid-December. It wasn’t until June 2017 that Centrelink started paying her pension, just 24 hours after then-Braddon MHR Justine Keay had intervened. “I still don't understand the problem. The people at Burnie (Centrelink) asked me to get all the information in and I complied with that,” Ms Ferris said. She said Centrelink rejected her application, which started a six-month battle. Related reading “The information they sent back was from 1999 and it wasn’t relevant. All the information I had given to Burnie suddenly seemed to not be in Canberra. “I was at the end of my tether. I thought this was never going to happen. I felt nobody was listening. “I want to thank Justine for all the help she has given me.” Despite a Department of Human Services staff member from Queensland phoning and apologising, Ms Ferris said she wanted someone higher up to take responsibility. “I wanted them to say they would improve the system so it wouldn’t happen to other people.” Ms Keay said it should not have to take political intervention for people to get a routine application processed in a timely way. “People who decide to retire don’t think it's going to take months and months and months to get an application to be assessed.” Community and Public Sector Union regional secretary Madeline Northam said more than 5000 jobs had been cut from the DHS, which runs Centrelink and there were another 1280 jobs to go. “Between Devonport and Burnie, there are 30 empty desks (in Centrelink offices) ... That has a direct impact on regional communities. The people of Braddon deserve quality public services.” Ms Ferris said people were more important than budgets. “There's just common decency and common procedures that you should follow.” A Department spokesperson said they worked hard to process all claims as quickly as possible. Some complex claims could take longer and they understood this could be frustrating. “Processing times can vary depending on the complexity of the individual case and how many claims have been submitted to the department at any one time,” the spokesperson said. “Age Pension claims often involve assessing complex income and asset information, and we frequently need to seek additional information from the person making the claim. “The department prioritises claims for people experiencing financial hardship and encourages anyone in these circumstances to contact us.” The spokesperson said the average call wait time was around 16 minutes this financial year to date. “The department has a range of initiatives under way to reduce call wait times and we are already seeing the benefits of this work, such as less busy signals,” the spokesperson said.

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