What not to do when applying for a Commonwealth Seniors Health Card (CSHC)

Recently, many older Australians have received energy rebates. But some are missing out on another entitlement available to many older Australians – one that often slips under the radar.

It’s called a Commonwealth Seniors Health Card (CSHC). No asset test is applied, just an income test that was increased to $95,400 for singles and $152,640 for couples late last year. This means that it is now available to most of Australia’s 1.25 million self-funded retirees. You can apply online, through a services centre, or by mailing your application.

The rules are straightforward. Apart from meeting the income test limits, you need to be an Australian resident and of pension age (67). Benefits can vary according to your state of residence and your health needs, but savings on medical, transport and energy costs can be between $2000 to $3000 a year.

Given these savings, you might wonder why more people haven’t applied. Maybe they heard about my misadventures?

As I’ve been writing about retirement income and Centrelink rules for about 20 years, I thought I would manage our joint (couple) application easily. First, I downloaded the 18-page, 83-question application form from the Centrelink website. It’s certainly not for the faint-hearted.

Next, I assembled and attached the eight other required documents. For this, I needed help from our accountant, as the request for information regarding retirement income streams (SA330) was less than clear.

Those unfamiliar with Centrelink may find it unwieldy and simply give up. But this means you will miss out on your rightful entitlements.

We then needed to go to a Centrelink office as our application for a Centrelink Reference Number (CRN) had failed online. The staff helped us get our CRNs, and admitted that there was a glitch with the myGov site, which was why it hadn’t worked for us (and presumably thousands of others). Next they checked our application and documentation, assured us all was in order and said we would hear back soon.

And this is where the process seemed to fall apart. Only one of us received the notification (via email, but lost in spam) that we would be unsuccessful unless we responded with extra information within a week. Of course, not seeing this (as it landed in spam) meant we missed the deadline, and we were later informed by mail that we had been rejected.