Compensation for Detriment caused by Defective Administration
The Compensation for Detriment caused by Defective Administration (CDDA) Scheme allows government agencies to consider and provide compensation for inappropriate actions or defective administration that causes a loss to a person. Decisions on CDDA applications relating to defective administration or inaction caused by the department are made by the Minister for Social Services (or a person authorised by the Minister to make this decision).
Payments made under the CDDA Scheme are discretionary. This means there is no automatic entitlement to a payment.
Importantly, if a mistake has been made by the Department of or an official of the Department, it does not automatically mean compensation is payable under the CDDA Scheme.
Knowing when to claim compensation
You can apply for compensation from us if:
- our actions give rise to a legal liability (for example, negligence)
- you have financial losses, injury or other harm caused by our mistake or ‘defective administration’.
Claims for ‘defective administration’ are covered by the Compensation for Detriment caused by Defective Administration Scheme (CDDA Scheme).
Any individual, company or other organisation can submit an application for compensation. You can do this yourself or through an authorised nominee or representative.
Please note, we may not be able to compensate you if other options (such as requesting a review) will resolve the issue.
How to make a claim for compensation
If you wish to lodge a CDDA claim against DSS, please email discretionarypayments@dss.gov.au
In your email, you will need to:
- describe the alleged defective administration,
- explain how the actions or inactions were defective,
- provide details of the detriment being claimed, including an explanation of how the amount claimed is calculated, and
- explain how the defective administration directly caused the detriment.
You should also include relevant evidence in support of your application. This could include correspondence between yourself and the relevant NCE, medical certificates, receipts etc.
Your claim needs to show our legal liability or defective administration.
Legal liability
We’ll consider whether we’re legally liable to compensate you. You need to show all of the following:
- we had a legal duty of care to you
- we breached that duty of care
- you suffered a loss or disadvantage because of the breach
- there's a reasonable connection between the breach and the loss or disadvantage suffered.
Defective administration
Where there’s no legal right to compensation, we’ll consider whether we can compensate you under the Compensation for Detriment caused by Defective Administration Scheme (the CDDA Scheme). You need to show all of the following:
- our administration was defective
- you suffered a loss or detriment as a result
- we could reasonably have expected you would suffer the loss or detriment as a result.
The CDDA Scheme cannot be used in relation to social security debts, or registered child support debts or overpayments. Read about the CDDA Scheme(Opens external website) on the Department of Finance website.
When you submit the claim
We’ll send you an acknowledgement email within 5 business days of receiving a claim.
We aim to resolve claims within 4 weeks. However this isn’t always possible for complex claims. We’ll send you a letter or email about the outcome of your claim.
We may ask you to sign a settlement deed if your claim is approved. Signing this means you cannot make any future claims against us about the same matter.
After you hear from us
If you don’t agree with a decision or how we’ve handled your claim, you can send an email to discretionarypayments@dss.gov.au or lodge a complaint (a link to the ‘Making a complaint’ page should be hyperlinked here) with the department.
If you still disagree with the decision, you can contact the Commonwealth Ombudsman. They'll consider whether the decision was reasonable in the circumstances. You can call the Ombudsman’s office(Opens external website) for the cost of a local call anywhere in Australia.
Alternatives to compensation
If you have a complaint, compliment or suggestion (a link to the ‘Making a complaint’ page should be hyperlinked here) we want to hear from you even if compensation is not appropriate.
The Commonwealth has a number of other discretionary options to address the financial impacts of Commonwealth decisions that have an unintended, unfair, unreasonable or inappropriate impact on a person.
The Department of Finance reviews claims for act of grace payments and waivers of debts. These are for people who are unintentionally disadvantaged by the effects of Australian Government legislation, actions or omissions. Decisions for these decisions are not made by the Department of Social Services. They are instead made by the Finance Minister (or delegate). For more information, please visit the Department of Finance website ( www.finance.gov.au(Opens external website)).
Contacts
- Discretionary Payments team: discretionarypayments@dss.gov.au
- Department of Finance: SFC@finance.gov.au