Definition of Hardship
The Telecommunications Consumer Protections Code (TCP) defines financial hardship
as:
a situation where a Customer is unable, reasonably, because of illness, unemployment
or other
reasonable cause, to discharge those obligations if payment and/or Service arrangements
were
changed. Financial hardship can be of limited or long term duration.
Identification of a Customer Experiencing Financial Hardship
gotalk considers financial hardship a state that involves an inability of the customer
to pay bills,
rather than an unwillingness to do so. Customer hardship can come about from a variety
of
situations and can result from a number of factors including:
» Loss of employment by the consumer or family member.
» Family breakdown.
» Illness including physical incapacity, hospitalization, or mental illness of the
consumer or family member.
» A death in the family.
» Abuse of service by a third party leaving the consumer unable to pay the account.
» Natural Disaster.
Financial Counsellors
For a current list of community financial counselling services, please consult the
Financial
Counselling Australia website: www.financialcounsellingaustralia.org.au
Reaching a Financial Arrangement
The basic principle of any agreed financial arrangement is that the repayment should
be sufficient to
cover expected future use of the service (as adjusted to ensure the consumer’s financial
position
does not worsen over a reasonable period of time) as well as providing continued
reduction of debt
at a reasonable level (i.e. the consumer should not be going into further debt under
the
arrangement). To enable this to occur, there are options available to gotalk and
our customers
to manage the use of their services. For example, we may agree to restrict access
to a service, or bar
access to certain call types.
To assist us in assessing your application for hardship assistance, we will need
you to provide your
account details and other personal information so that we can verify you as the
account holder of
the service. Depending of your circumstances of your application, we may also require
documentation in support of the information you provide to us as part of your application
(i.e. a
letter from your doctor if your hardship is due to illness). If we will require
such supporting
information from you, we will advise you when we discuss your application with you.
How to Find Out More
By Phone
Hardship Inquiries: 1800 468 255
Hours of Operation: Monday – Friday 9:00am – 5:00pm AEST
By Email
contactus@gotalk.com
By Post
gotalk Customer Service - Financial Hardship
Suite 11.03, Level 11, 201 Kent Street,
Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia