Centrelink panic attack

What a fuckin way to start the day.....

So I check my emails this morning to find out if my psychologist has replied about the letter needed for the Housing application. He has, saying it'll be ready at the front desk today. David has an appt there today to see his too, so I ring them and say it's OK for my partner David to pick up this letter while he's there. All good. 

I then notice I have a notification of an online letter from Centrelink. WTF do they want I wonder. So I log into Centrelink and read the letter they've sent to my account. It has some bullshit Centrelink crap that nobody knows WTF it means exactly, saying that the rent assistance was being stopped. No explanation other than one line saying the accommodation was shared and the payments adjusted.

WTF??    I got paid today nearly $200 less for the fortnight! I fuckin lost it man. Swearing into the air at the Centrelink idiots. David still hasn't had his claim finished, still has zero money, we're in the financial shit big time, and then they take away the rent assistance? What in the hell is going on with these fuckwits? So I decide I have to go down to Centrelink immediately to sort this all out.

Downloaded the letter, then had to transfer the bloody thing to David's PC because Windows 8 won't recognise the printer. I start feeling really sick and shaking, threw up all the pills from the morning, and was getting really short of breath. David comes out from the shower, see's me, tells me to breath in through my nose and out through my mouth. Eventually I settle down a bit and get the thing printed, grab David's stuff too, and head off to Centrelink.

The wait wasn't too long, I get to see a very helpful lady. She'd called out David's name as I wanted to sort out his shit too being his partner. I say I'm actually his partner as he had to go to an appt. All fine. So we start with WTF is going on with David's claim which has been in progress since July 2nd. So she brings up the online claim that we did on Friday. She notices that there was no appt booked. I have no idea what that means. Apparently we were supposed to book an appt at the end of the online claim process. Oh yes I remember that bit now I say, and that it wouldn't let me do it. And as a matter of fact we had to wait half a day before the online claim thing wasn't "temporarily unavailable". Some head honcho Centrelink lady overhears at the next desk and joins the conversation saying that that was interesting about the site not working as they'd had hardly anyone make an online claim there.

So, after a couple of phone calls to somewhere in the Centrelink bowels, the lady manages to get a phone appt made for this afternoon. This should be the final bit..... well I've heard that before.

Lastly I ask about what's going on with my rent assistance. She looks at it on the PC and realises what's happened. Of course it's not at all what the one line on the letter was saying. She says that when a partner puts a Centrelink claim in process, the other partner has the rent assistance adjusted until the claim is completed. I haven't got the faintest idea why, but that's the case. The rent assistance is then automatically reinstated when the partner making the new claim has that finished, and I'll get backpaid what I'm short. Supposed to happen automatically, but the lady said if it doesn't to come in and see them. They're actually very good at that office, very helpful. 

In effect then, my rent assistance has been put on hold as part of the David claim for the Sickness Allowance - come Newstart. Fuck, why couldn't they have just put a simple paragraph in the three page letter they sent explaining this to me? Instead of having me go into a bloody panic attack about it all? *sheesh*