A backlog of more than one million claims made to Services Australia is set to return to normal levels by the middle of the year following a mass recruitment drive.
Figures have shown more than 500,000 Centrelink and Medicare claims have been processed and removed from the overall backlog in just 10 weeks.
It comes after more than 3000 new staff were hired by Services Australia in a recruitment blitz to deal with the ballooning backlog of claims.
There were 1.1 million claims outstanding as of December 2023, while the backlog peaked at 1.35 million.
Government Services Minister Bill Shorten said the organisation was focused on getting through the backlog as quickly as possible.
“We absolutely acknowledge the frustration of people waiting for payments but for the first time in a long time, we are headed in the right direction,” he said.
“These new recruits helped reduce claims by almost 40 percent and Australians will continue to see improvements as the new staff increase their skills and experience.
“We hope to reduce outstanding claims back to usual levels by mid-year.”
The federal government had in 2023 announced more than $200 million (US$131 million) in funding to hire extra staff to help deal with the burgeoning number of claims being lodged.
The chief executive of Services Australia David Hazlehurst told a Senate estimates hearing in February he expected the number of outstanding claims to be between 400,000 and 500,000 by April.
While the hiring process began in January, Mr. Hazlehurst previously said the training process would mean it would still take time before there would be a sizeable dent in the claims backlog.
Since the staff appointments, Medicare online account claims have decreased by 78 percent while claims on Commonwealth seniors health cards have declined by 59 percent.
“Reducing the outstanding claims will help bring down call wait times as fewer people will be on the phone to check what’s happening with their claims,” Mr. Shorten said.
