Centrelink and Medicare clients have blasted the Department of Human Services (DHS) for developing mobile apps they claim don’t work properly.
The Express Plus app, which comes in several formats including one for job seekers, families on benefits, parents entitled to child support, students and Medicare clients has attracted overwhelmingly negative reviews on Android’s Google Play and Apple’s App Store. The most poorly rated of the lot were Express Plus Medicare and Express Plus Jobseekers.
The most common criticisms levelled at DHS were apps failing to load, screens crashing, users being kicked out, baffling error messages, log-in problems, frequent demands to reset passwords or pins, being unable to report changes in income or circumstances and difficulties uploading and sending photographs of documents.
The Medicare app, whose has features include lodging a claim and ordering a new Medicare card, received the lowest user rating from iPhone owners, who collectively gave it a paltry 1.5 stars out of five.
One user exclaimed: “I can’t actually believe how bad this app is. Loads a blank page most of the time. I have no idea if my claim went through. It is unbelievably frustrating when I have to go to Medicare because this app doesn’t work and they tell me to get the app and are promoting a myGov account everywhere in the office. Useless!”
One user said Express Plus was “an example of how not to do an app: slow, illogically placed icons, poor overall design. To top it off it seems to load a blank screen 99 per cent of the time, rendering it entirely useless”.
Other users bluntly branded Express Plus “a time-wasting turd of an app” … and worse.
App users said it had been “extremely buggy” for many months and asked that it be fixed.
While some users ended up frustrated and angry after using Express Plus, the fallout was more serious for some users grappling with the Job Seeker app.
A few job seekers said that their payments were cut after they had problems reporting changes in income or circumstances or being unable to send documents they had photographed or attach files.
Users have complained of bugs in the app that tell users they are too early to report but then too late, with no window where they are actually able to use this function.
One said: “Don’t trust this app. You need to check the website to be sure. You could end up cut off if you’re not careful.”
This is exactly what one unlucky job seeker claimed had happened to them.
“This app has cost me the last four Centrelink payments because of not being able to report and missing out on payments until they work it all out after going down there and waiting in line for ages (cuz everyone else is there for the same reason) or being on the phone on hold for over an hour and a half. Got the app for free – ended up costing me a job and over $200. Not happy.”
Another said: “I now have not been paid because the docs didn’t upload. Thanks Centrelink. Worst app ever.”
Clients struggling with Centrelink and Medicare mobile apps on their phones spells extra trouble for DHS frontline staff too, many of whom have to deal with the fallout when people come into the office to complain.
One disenchanted user said: “I was in Centrelink and they told me to just use this app to upload a file. Didn’t work. Redid upload six more times. Still doesn’t work. Useless as always.”
Another felt the app was being used by Centrelink staff to avoid serving customers.
“Got told to use app to submit documents because it was near closing time and nobody wanted to do it. Surprise, surprise it won’t let me.”
It’s a worrying situation for the massive government department which has recently lost its senior innovation strategist and has a huge and complex task on its hands.
Senior bureaucrat Ben Rimmer, who was leading the MyGov digital strategy up until January left his job to become CEO of the City of Melbourne and there is no sign of a replacement in sight.
But DHS General Manager Hank Jorgen said that this did not reflect reality.
“It is completely incorrect to suggest there is no oversight of the department’s digital direction following recent organisational changes. Senior Executives in the department have individual carriage of different aspects of work relating to digital strategy and our online presence. This is an ongoing focus and has always remained a priority.”
But DHS can take heart that its app does have some fans.
One Express Plus job seeker said: “Love that I can do all my business quickly and easily without having to leave the comfort of home, especially fortnightly forms or to check email or appointment times on the run. Either way, it’s great.”
Another happy camper said: “After thirty mins trying to link our myGov account and Medicare account to get our daughter’s immunisation records for school I remembered I had the app set up. Ran it, got the records printed in under a minute. Awesome.”
Many apps users praised the concept behind the app but not the execution: “Fantastic idea – [I] just need it to work.”
Another opined: “The thought is there but this is just badly executed’.
Government News spoke to Danny Gorog, Director of mobile app design company Outware Mobile to get his take on Express Plus. He could not get the Express Plus app to work properly.
“It’s pretty disappointing, actually. This is a key service from the government and I would have thought that they would put a bit more effort into it. I’m concerned to think how much taxpayer money has been spent,” Mr Gorog said.
He said the app did not conform to Apple or Google’s design guidelines, for example on areas such as menu design or navigation.
“It’s got its own random interface that not many people will be familiar with. Unfortunately it doesn’t look like DHS have consulted the guidelines at all.”
Mr Gorog said money would be better spent making apps that work, as oppose to funnelling resources into government service centres.
His criticised the app for not providing log-in information or indicating how to get a user name and password (tip: you have to do this first via the MyGov website) and providing no description for the button to enter the app.
“When I try to load the app it gets stuck on this process screen that doesn’t seem to resolve. It is basically unusable, which is very disappointing,” he said.
Asked how the app could be improved Mr Gorog said DHS needed to “start taking stuff seriously”.
“DHS have a great opportunity; if they can get this app into a position where it works really well they’re driving through self-service behaviour through the app.
“They’re spending a lot of money building a retail network (but) self service seems to be the right model. You can only provide self service if the tools that you give people are usable. You have got to invest in it.”
Mr Gorog said the app shouldn’t just be developed and then forgotten about.
“If you’re going to have an app out there, fix it and make sure it works. Someone needs to take responsibility for an app and it’s generally the person who created the app.”
Perhaps an Express Plus Centrelink customer put it most succinctly: “Centrelink don’t run before you can walk! Don’t deliver a half-finished, non-working product to your customers!”
The Department of Human Services was contacted for comment on the user comments and said it will respond shortly.
Comment below to have your say on this story.
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I agree about the website being rubbish as is the phone service. My daughter has a disability and is in tears after a “Centrelink Day” because that’s a minimum of how long it takes and it’s still not fixed. Her payment was stopped because she didn’t provide a form in December that is not available until March when uni returns.
Today I tried to sort it our with her and after many hours negotiating Centring, the MyGov site and uni admin we are no better off. The uni said they don’t have that particular documentation, MyGov continually locked us out and then said wait 12 hours so we created new account… As for the phonecall, the person just argued when I told her how hard it was for a person with a disability to negotiate such abysmal and alienating services and disagreed with the devastating impact it was having on my daughter’s health and wellbeing. How she could argue that I’ll never know!
Meanwhile the payment is discontinued, my daughter is upset and highly anxious, I am frustrated and really angry and we are no better off. The website was useless and almost impossible to navigate and although the person the on the phone said we could upload a form, we actually couldn’t! It’s all like a secret vault and would probably make a good episode in the Harry Potter series. I detest Centrelink and the attitude of their staff.
H Maree, I am happy to do a follow-up story and contact Centrelink about what’s been happening to you, if you would like to (no pressure at all if not, though). It sounds like a nightmare. You can contact me on 02 8586 6130 or msansom@intermedia.com.au Thanks, Marie.
This app is indeed crap! The last time I went to the office to claim, the drop box was gone and I was told to use the app in future. Well that all sounded easy until I spent the last 3 days trying to submit my claim using it! It keeps coming up with “no stable internet connection “. I have a brand new phone and full 4G signal. So they say don’t come in to the office, the app doesn’t work, so how am I meant to claim? If this is how they’re going to do things, then the Medicare rebate needs to be deducted from the bill at time of payment at the Dr. EVERY time, not sometimes.
Totally agree with your comments.
This is exactly why the UK decided not to develop apps and to design the website for mobile use. Apps require support.
I wholeheartedly agree! Why can’t we get the website on our mobiles & tablets? So much easier to use.
I have the app on my mobile & tablet, yet cannot get my digital card – that’s all that I need it for. When I receive my new card, I will be scanning it & putting a PDF copy on both my phone & android.
I can also attest to the appalling technical difficulties with the online service and the governments harsh compliance measures which are causing clients of the service to loose their benefits and placing undue hardship onto people.
I recently applied online for Newstart. I attended my interview after waiting an hour and a half past the interview time. The next day I received an email telling me that I had not attended the interview. After spending at least forty minutes on hold waiting to speak to a customer service officer I finally did speak to someone who very intelligent and her communication skills were very good. She was able to find evidence of what I talked about with the Centrelink officer and verify that I had attended and the officer had failed to flag the attended interview box.
A week after this, several emails arrived in my inbox that were dated 1970’s and therefore dropped way to the bottom of my email list. It was only by chance that I found them doing a clean out. I was due to receive an immediate payment of $300 but because I failed to report I did not get this. On my Government website and Centrelink website it says in bold that my next report date is July 2013. How could I have attended the reporting date when all information from Centrelink is inacurate. I am in the middle of waiting for a Job Capacity Assessment as I have a disability. This interview is today 4th of March 2015.
As a result of missing out on my immediate payment I am unable to pay my rent or buy food.
HI Victoria, happy to follow this up with a story with you (I’m on 02 8586 6130 or msansam@intermedia.com.au) or to pass on your number to Centrelink and they will get a customer service person to call you to sort out your case. That’s what Centrelink offered to do for the other person who commented here. Thanks, Marie
A few weeks ago I was directed to the Medicare Express Plus app by staff at the Glen Waverley medicare office informing me that the office was shutting down. I downloaded the app on i-phone, registered correctly with myGov and uploaded copies of medical receipts through the claim process within the app.
This occurred on 9 April 2015. Today is 14 April 2015 at 2:30pm. No claim has been processed, nobody answers the phone at medicare and its website is not loading after log-in. Meanwhile the Government is holding my money and I need it.
The process is flawed.
Glad to see your article. Medicare staff are now handing out pamphlets telling people to use the app even though it doesn’t work. Note that if it dies before you get a receipt number, they cannot tell you if the claim was actually processed for 3 days afterwards.
Agree it is illogical, clumsy and s-l-o-w
I concur with the quote in the article title and the experience of using a failed DHS app. Seriously, did anyone who worked on this do a user acceptance test or even just a one off trial run on an android or iOS phone to see if it worked? Put the poor design and convoluted registration process to the side for the moment: the app just does not function, timing out 9 out of 10 tries. And we’re not talking the back of Burke here: Brisbane CBD location. Worse, the error message I keep getting is a blank page with the DHS logo and the quote ‘the server request could not be processed’ – there is no way to exit from this page, to go back, to restart the app…actually to do anything. Task kill the app and try again is the only way out. Perhaps it’s server capacity? Again: how many clients does the DHS have and what percentage of them would be expected to use the app – this is predictable and should be planned for – just like doing an UAT before releasing into the wild. DHS need to patch of kill these pieces of sh1t or they should expect to continue to receive bad press.
I reckon they did test them, but in the limited way that dinosaur bureaucrats think testing should be done (ie. using a handful of human testers to manually run through a list of test scripts in the week before each release). If they had followed modern development and continuous delivery practices, including the automation of testing using services like Xamarin Test Cloud or Saucelabs, where you can run thousands of test cases against thousands of devices each and every day, then they might have half decent products.
It could be interpreted by government departments that’s it’s the user or the users equipment that is at fault.
Sometimes I get lucky with the APP more normal though is hours of wasted time and the APP crashing. The whole system is geared towards the governments convenience but not the customers. If you live in a high density area, there are no problems because there are offices all over the place. If you live in an area like central Vic over an hour from an office wether it be for medicare claims etc. this APP is a joke. Ringing up is no easier.
I can’t even imagine the frustration for older people in country areas or people who arnt familiar with technology. It would be enormous just to claim for simple things.
These government departments are clearly moving along like a runaway train with no driver. Sooner or later it’s going to disable itself!. It’s already happening and no one has the power to stop this crazy ,rediculous way of dealing with the mass’s.
What do you expect from any Government online services.
The problem is simple. The Government go for either the cheapest possible solution or coded in house by those who would never get a job with a privately owned software company.
Centrelink would have to be close to the worse of all
I’ve started my age pension claim on line but I’m moving to paper. The online form wants exact dates for periods lived overseas and I am obliged to enter false information because I just don’t know exact dates from events 50 years ago!!!
Also, my residence and employment situation will change during the time the application is being processed, and I can’t explain that to an online form.
Tried to link my husband’s Centrelink account to MyGov last night and the system wanted the serial number of his citizenship certificate, and other very detailed info to prove identity. He already receives the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card so all has been proved. Needless to say, we failed to link his Centrelink account to My Gov and will have to spend a Centrelink Day trying to fix it I guess. Waited 90 mins on the phone last week – no answer
Hi Wendy,
When linking your Centrelink info to MyGov, you do have to go thru some rigamorole to ensure that the person doing it is the same person they have on file.
Even though you have provided the information, the computer system still needs to verify your identity. There are several ways in which they do this, but on the other hand, they cover their backs for your security.
They also wanted my ex’s citizenship certificate number for him to link his centrelink account. It all depends on which questions pop up on the system when linking accounts – it’s all randomly generated.
When you are claiming different payments, you still need to provide your POI, even if you have it already on the system.
My ex was retrenched in 2010, and applied for the Dole & Carer Payment on the same day, and he still had to go thru the whole application process from start. They finally put him on Carer Payment in about 2 days, as the Dole would have taken up to 12 weeks to process. He was already receiving Carer Allowance.
Hope this clears up some confusion as to why you need to verify yourself every time.
I am living overseas and am the correspondence nominee for my mother who is in aged care and suffers dementia.
I have received a letter from Centrelink in my MyGov inbox dated 01/07/2015 with the subject Income Stream/s so presumably something to do with my mother’s aged pension (I am not receiving any benefits myself).
When I click on the message it shows an attachment a new browser tab opens with the message “Attachment Not Available The attachment is temporarily unavailable.”
So this has been happening for 9 days now (I try every day to view the mail).
I can’t go to a Centrelink office since they don’t have one where I live overseas.
I could call them I suppose but an hour or two on the phone at international calling rates would send me broke. The 1800 number provided for my country doesn’t work.
I sent an email via their website but haven’t received a response.
I am obligated to respond to any request from Centrelink within 14 days. How is this possible when I can’t even view their letter?
Their software is broken, and it looks like I will be the victim.
I too was unable to open or read the attachment. It turned out that I could read the attachment by logging into MyGov. However, an easier way was to download the Centerlink app. I have so far found this app to be easy to use and very quick. I will never log on to Centerlink again through the net now that I have the app.
How frustrating is the whole MYGOV and Centre link website. Tried numerous times to link my Centre but finally had to resort to calling support who gave me a code. took 2 days to get that sorted. So tried for first time to open MYGOV kept getting HTTP errors. When I did finally get on site the link to Centre link didn’t work. The whole system is a joke and trying to call help service is totally frustrating can spend hours on the phone, and still the systems are down or crashes inexplicably. Doesn’t appear that anyone is taking the problems seriously because 3 months after linking Centre link to MYGOV the same issues are still there. If I don’t report income then I lose my benefit, but site is down again today 17/07/2105
Disappointed!Truly can’t believe what has become of once such a great department of DHS.Oh Wait, I know what’s happened, Gov is slashing jobs and roles within Centrelink and Medicare to have a higher growth profit and introducing these useless apps which are supposed to replace the work force who all got fired for Gov personal interests!Thats why it takes up to 10 business days for any type of transaction to complete because there are no more people working!!!Its probably 2 poor admin workers who are working 9 to 5 processing millions of these transactions daily and are buried in piles of unprocessed applications.Earning a low income of 42k + super, and Gov is benefiting from all of this financially that’s why when u put in a claim it reads, it will be processed in due time!When is the due time, has anyone got any Idea?And how much is the refund for?They don’t care about people, they use our money to get the interest required to make the millioners and Gov rich, they don’t care about ordinary Workers, we are just numbers who work 65 years and get slashed with tax which gov.again benefits from, becuase when we retire we basically live in poverty till the end of our miserable lifes..Thanks Tony, I’ll be sure not to vote for u in the next election run and the way you’re going there will be one very soon!Cheers, regards, unhappy citizen of Australia!
Just shoot me … please! I have spent all day trying to connect with Centrelink through my myGov account as it is my reporting day. Guess what (of course you guessed correctly) ‘system unavailable’ … since 8 am this morning !!!!!! No point in phoning them as it’s a public holiday in NSW … guess I’ll have to spend my lunch break tomorrow on the phone to their 13 # ok time for a Bex and a lie down.
The Express Plus apps are indeed crap for a couple of reasons I don’t think have been listed above.
1. The app can work on both an iPad and an iPhone, but you must use different PINs for each device, and of you alternate between devices you must reset the pin each time you change. And the app won’t let you use a PIN you have used previously, so if you start at 0001 and alternate devices, so the iPad uses even numbers and the iPad uses odd numbers, you will run out of numbers after 500 uses. Really?
2. Document uploads require the use of the device’s camera. Most apps that do this also allow access to your photos so you can use an existing photo, but not this app. Just recently I had to submit a 26 page form. Imagine photographing 26 pages and sending them individually. As a minimum it should be possible to upload an existing PDF instead of printing it and photographing it.
Of course you can also access these services using MyGov.
What we need is someone with some skills at workflows to analyse what people will use these apps for, and create the tools that deliver the required outcomes.
What amateur decided that PINs have to change each time an alternate device is used on the same account?
It’s not just their app, but the entire online system.I have tried to contact Centrelink regarding change of study details, for the reason being that the online account doesn’t work properly. Three emails and no responses, so i ended up figuring out the answer after scouring their site, only to find that the site would not let me enter my study details properly.
It’s a frustrating process. To think that every incoming government has constantly downgraded Centrelink services by reducing staff with the view that they can deny the reality – that people will need social services at some point of their lives.
In my case, I’ve tried to do the right thing, but the stupid website doesn’t permit certain dates being entered and so on, telling me that my study dates are invalid. It’s ridiculous. Last year they actually entered the name of my university incorrectly and then denied that their systems failed. Telephoning them is impossible, you’re waiting all day. Emailing them is also impossible, because you have to bombard them with emails for them to answer you, and even if you tell them that you want them to respond via email, they’ll call you and then if you can’t answer the call [if you’re at work], they’ll send you an email to tell you that they tried to contact you. Quite annoying and soul destroying.
I can’t use the app on my Google Nexus tablet. I log on, but when I try to do anything, the app crashes and restarts – have to do it all via the website.
Very unimpressed with their digital services.
I was on Austudy a few years ago, when they first introduced income reporting by app. I thought it was great, I was reporting my income, payments were coming through, no worries. They did an audit last year and found out that the system wasn’t recording my income and as a result I now have a $9000+ debt to repay.
Unfortunately, even if it isn’t your fault that you are overpaid you are still liable to repay.
Hi Michael, happy to follow up your story if you’d like to email me: msansom@intermedia.com.au but, of course, no pressure. Thanks.
Hi Michael, happy to follow up your story if you’d like to email me: msansom@intermedia.com.au but, of course, no pressure. Thanks.
Their whole system is a mess. Nothing works and the staff have seriously faults in their idea of “customer service” and they have a mentality that all customers are in the wrong. Even my mother who works in the call centres defends her coworkers over me when I tell her about my experiences with their customer service operatives in the offices!!
I am currently on the phone looking at waiting to get through to someone after the app refused to accept the pin I have been using for over a year. Their automated phone service is atrocious. Took me three attempts before the damned system put me in the queue to speak to an actual person.
Also getting really tired of being prompted to create a voice recognition log in.
There is no way in hell I will be doing that when they can’t get their existing systems to work.
At the point where I truly believe their system is rigged to cause you to mess up so they can cancel your payments so they have one less poor person to deal with.
Almost a conspiracy.
It is frustrating to deal with Centrelink, and I hate to say that because I just want to be a cordial customer and have my matter dealt with, but there is so much stuffy around it is extremely frustrating and hard to hide after a day or days of the same ‘get no-where’ crap. I went into Centrelink to submit documents that I needed to submit and was told that I cannot do that and I need to upload them online. I tried at least 50 times online and then at least another 50 times using the mobile app. Nothing. Doesnt work. I call to speak to someone and am told by a voice recording to please be respectful to their customer service personnel – because they are very much aware that their system is so flawed, extremely frustrating and a complete waste of everyone’s time. Taking time off work and/or study to get matters dealt with and hours/days later it is still an outstanding matter. I submitted my Austudy claim in October 2015, am studying full time and working also and am on a Newstart payment. I was told the other day when I went in to Centrelink that it is not their responsibility to make sure that I am on the correct payment! But when I try to get myself on the correct payment I cant lodge the required forms!! Oh how I dread having to deal with Centrelink. Oh how I DREAD IT!!!! Pain followed by more pain.
I downloaded the app onto my tablet and I cant use the same pin as my phone but if I change the pin for the tablet the pine on the phone won’t work unless I chsnge it again
I must admit that just the thought of dealing with Centerlink on any level makes me feel quite ill. Everything is so long-winded and complicated and some representatives give wrong info or pass you around. The Centerlink phone number should be made free because of the wait times. The whole set up needs restructuring.
It almost as if it’s organised chaos, like the DHS make its so overly complicated and stupidly conviluted that is meant to divert and deter any potential job seekers from seeking assistance, as a full time employed tax payer it’s so incredibly disappointing that so much of our money is being wasted on the antiquated apathetic department and not getting to those in need of assistance, the real bludger here are those working and involved with the department of human services how embarrassing to be a part of the worst government department in Australia’s history lowest feedback and approval from the public in recorded history. Shame shame shame as an old aussie would say.
I expect more if only I had the power to sack the lot and give some of the job seekers a go and running the useless department, they couldn’t do worse.
I downloaded the centrelink plus app and it required a password change. I am a nominee for my disabled daughter for her online income reporting. I thought it may make things easier than logging on each fortnight via the internet to report the 3 hours a week work she does as I seem to have trouble with the website not allowing me the option some weeks via the reporting box. I then have to contact centrelink to report, which requires a lengthy wait via the phone. I work fulltime and find this difficult to spend my entire lunch hour sometimes to be on hold then have to hang up without being answered. I’m frustrated with the whole system and am unable to line up at centrelink with work commitments myself. There must be a simpler way to do this. I don’t understand when her work hours are only 3 every week why I even need to report. Her pay only ever differs by cents or one or two dollars. Never over her working limit. It causes such a lot of unnecessary stress to my family. It is concerning to me that when I leave the country and there is no one to help whilst I am overseas that her payments immediately cease. How is this fair? She is unable to access this service alone. Does anyone out there know of a better way. I also have the voice authenticated service but find I can’t get the answers I need via this service either. Does she need to go a month without payments whilst I am away on a much earned break.
I am grateful however of the help I do receive when I finally do get to speak with a customer service officer. My problems are always rectified. I just find getting onto Centrelink the problem.
My wife reports her income each fortnight. It is always a round dollar figure (set hours, set $ and no cents). We received a query from DHS / Centrelink asking why she did not report cents. She explained the fact that there are never any cents on the figure. In any case there does not seem to be a way to add cents to the dollars (no way to put a dot after the $).
Firstly if you cannot report in cents surely Centrelink staff would know that!
Secondly, you cannot put in a fractional hour so we round up, not down.
Thirdly, surely Centrelink have more to do than worry about a few cents!
Coming from rural NSW we have a ‘self help’ mygov medicare kiosk at the post office.
I first tried to call Medicare and got the recorded message that they weren’t taking calls at the moment, sorry, goodbye…
Right.
Needless to say, after enrolling with mygov, creating a medicare online account and linking the two I hoped that I would be in business (that took 20 minutes), not so.
After failed attempts to navigate the system I gave up and tried at home on the laptop, no luck there as the laptop version of medicare doesn’t allow the processing of most claims as a phone photo needs to used.
After uploading the Ap onto my phone I was confident we were in business but discovered how appalling the Ap is to navigate as it doesn’t explain where all the provider numbers are or have help boxes for morons like me.
Finally took photo of receipt, filled in the boxes, submitted the form … “currently we are experiencing technical issues, please call Medicare…”
… tried to call Medicare and got the recorded message that they weren’t taking calls at the moment, sorry, goodbye…
Right.
difficult and frustrating service at best, and for those who dont have these technologies-totally disgusting Australian Government. You have lost touch with everyday Aussies. Shame on you.
I have a samsung phone and also tablet have tried to use the medicare app on both devices over several different days and several months apart. When I lodge the claim I get error messages such as no stable network, medicare app is experiencing techincal difficulties, network error. Or it freezes and never stops loading. Then I have to spend time re-entering the claim to try again before encountering the same round of error messages It simply does not work.
About 2 weeks ago I lodged a form for medicare claim in the dropbox at Cranbourne Centrelink, the box was completely full. My gov account shows no claim and I have had no refund. I wonder if they are processing the forms at all.
Silly me I didn’t take a pic of my claim / receipt for reference (although I thought I had). Guess that means I lose my refund. Not happy.
Every time I enter my 4 digit pin a loading screen starts only to lead to an error message telling me I cannot login at this time – please try again later! Horse shit! It’s been doing that every day since I installed it a week ago. I can’t claim for dental refunds because trying to claim online over the PC on the Mygov page using medicare login won’t recognise the claim codes.
And going to Centrelink is utterly useless because the staff there don’t know how to process the bloody claims! What the bloody hell has this country come to? Seems all our services are operated by dimwits who either haven’t had an education, can’t speak or understand English or they just don’t want to be bothered like the woman I encountered at Centrelink who just walked off and said “Suit yourself” when I said for all the trouble I’m having trying to make a claim I might as well toss the claim in the bin. So I got absolutely no help there. I can’t get help calling Medicare. And when I do get to speak to someone I’m always sent in circles being sent to another department.
Spent an hour on the phone to Centrelink last week setting up reporting for parenting payment for both mine and hubbies income. Hubby has thankfully found work so we are looking forward to getting off parenting payment… but they still let you report for 12 weeks to keep payment open if the job falls through etc…
So I go on today to report hubby’s income amd surprise – message reads I cannot report his income because of an outstanding report of his. He hasn’t been on any payments for months so who knows what that’s about.
Another 1-2 hours sorting out their mistake.
Happens so often and is very frustrating. They always accuse the customer and conveniently declare that no notes were recorded on the file from the previous phone call. Very few staff there have any idea what they’re doing. So sad.
So over centrelink Express. You cant delete if you make a mistake on your timesheet. When you report, if you want to change the amount or times you worked and earned, you cant re-enter without having to call or go to the centrelink office. The whole idea of this app is for convenience to the customers to alleviate the back log and workload of the centrelink workers and phone service. Defeats the purpose of this forced app and my gov onto customers. When i did need help, to change my earnings, i had to call and had i had the ordosity to inquiry to why theres such a long wait to get service, I get a sarcastic and unprofessionally
worker, stating “its because people like me dont use the online apps”. So to be honest, if your going to force people to use this pathetic and useless app then “FIX IT”.