Accounting Services
financial resources
Financial resources for the payment of pensions and lump sums are paid out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF). Department of Defence has a special appropriation which reimburses the CRF with the productivity component of the benefit. Contributions are paid to the CRF every fortnight.
debtors
At 30 June 2009, approximately $1.5m was due to the Authority in benefits overpaid under the DFRDB and DFRB Schemes. There are two common causes of overpayment, one being late notification to the Authority that the recipient is deceased. The second relates to re-entered recipients to the Defence Force where delays in notification results in overpayment of a pension.
Administrative processes are in place to reduce the chance of overpayments arising. Most overpaid benefits are recovered by the Authority.
During the year, over $62 000 in debts were written-off. Most write-offs occurred after the death of a pensioner where the bank account had been accessed by a third party for a period after the date of death or the funds had been used for funeral expenses. In some instances the debts were not legally recoverable or it had become uneconomical to pursue them.