Case studies

Australian Federal Police arrested a group of 5 people who allegedly stole $1.1 million from those managing the affairs of 70 people with National Disability Insurance Scheme plans. The group allegedly established 3 registered providers under the National Disability Insurance Scheme and provided over-inflated invoices or no service at all. If found guilty of the alleged offences, they face between 12 months and up to 10 years in prison.

A Queensland doctor was found guilty of defrauding Medicare out of more than $360,000.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, fraudsters contacted members of the public pretending to be from the UK Coronavirus Test and Trace service.

A Clean Energy Council accredited installer and licenced electrician falsely claimed to have conducted 8 solar installations. He signed multiple, small-scale technology certificate documents and Certificates of Electrical Compliance relating to these installations under the Small-scale renewable energy scheme.

A Melbourne woman was convicted of fraud after using $600,000 worth of resident’s deposits from an Aged Care facility. The company went into liquidation shortly afterwards leaving 42 residents without a home and debts of $4.5 million. She deceived residents when she told them their deposit money would be held in a trust account and that interest gained from the money would be used to reduce accommodation fees.

A man has been charged with allegedly assisting members of the public to fraudulently obtain Australian Government Disaster Recovery Payments that were intended to support victims of the NSW bushfires. Services Australia received a tip-off that the man was allegedly calling the hotline to claim payments on behalf of other people even though they were not adversely affected by the NSW bushfires. He would then receive payments or benefits in return. The man also allegedly threatened potential witnesses to the fraud.

A Brisbane man used two aliases to arrange an elaborate online job scam through various companies to steal the identities of 52 taxpayers. He lodged 62 fraudulent income tax returns and attempted to obtain over $565,000 in refunds. After conducting fake interviews over the phone the fraudster would email applicants to confirm they had been successful in their application for the job. He would also request a scanned copy of their driver’s license, bank account details, tax file number and shirt size. He used this information to fraudulently create myGov accounts. If they already had an account he used the information to take over their account and change the details as required. He would then link the myGov accounts to Australian Taxation Office’s online services where he would lodge false income tax returns in their names. The man was charged with 106 offences and was sentenced to 5 years in prison.

A well-organised child care fraud syndicate allegedly defrauded the Commonwealth Government’s Family Day Care Program of $4 million over a 10 month period.

A registered National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) services provider accessed the accounts of 230 Scheme participants between June and August 2018. He made 392 requests for payment from the NDIS for services that he did not provide. He pleaded guilty to defrauding the NDIS of more than $370,000 and attempting to obtain a further amount of more than $85,000. The man was sentenced to 4 years in prison. 

The operators of two sushi outlets acted recklessly by underpaying nine visa holders a total of $19,467 in wages and $7,416 in superannuation.