Service NSW 2021 COVID-19 Micro Business Grant – when government goes bad, stick to your principles

August 7, 2024

Service NSW Business Bureau under Executive Director Cassandra Gibbens and Service NSW CEO Greg Wells continue to behave unconscionably towards hundreds, if not thousands of New South Wales small business owners who have been legitimately approved recipients of the NSW Government’s pandemic lockdown compensation through 2021.

Liberal’s Gladys paid it out, and Labor’s incoming Chris Minns is clawing it back using unscrupulous anonymous debt collectors.

A fish rots from the head, and Chris Minns Mafia is accountable for the NSW Government’s ‘indian giving’ intimidation toward these ordinary small business owners. Service NSW so-called ‘audit’ is nothing but a government scam.

QUESTION: what would you do if you were on the receiving end of this series of emails purporting to be from government on Service NSW letterhead?

[NOTE: There are some eight pages in this email thread – scroll down to each page using the footer arrows below].

Service NSW Intimidation

Our Tips to Deal with Service NSW fake ‘audit’:

Protect your moral and legal rights – if someone you don’t know contacts you and sounds dodgy it is dodgy and so just immediately hang up – stick to your gut feel and moral principles;
Don’t pay any of the extortionate ransom demanded. It is a con;
Recognise that Service NSW is illegally engaging in baseless debt collection. It is not a financial ‘audit’ [A legitimate Tax Office Audit for is to examine the source documents already received in order to verify the accuracy of financial accounting information reported to it]. Whereas what Service NSW debt collectors are doing is attempting to a re-assessment from 2021, as if it was not approved. Wrong! It was assessed, approved and paid – end of contract! [‘Alteri stipulari nemo potest‘ – from the Latin legal translating to…”no-one can alter their own contract”];
Service NSW debt collectors are outsourced private contractors paid on an unscrupulous commission basis to hoodwink small business owners who legitimately received the 2021 COVID-19 Micro Business Grant (as lockdown compensation) under the previous NSW Liberal Government. None of them is qualified in tax, law or financial auditing;
They started their illegitimate claw back scam two weeks after the March 2023 state election and are working for the Minns NSW Labor Government, which is broke because the NSW Liberals wasted billions under Premier Berejiklian and then Premier Perrottet. Also because the Federal Labor Albanese Government has denied $6 billion in GST revenue to the NSW Minns Labor Government;
If some one phones you or emails you claiming they are from government (eg Service NSW) but using only their first name, this is illegitimate and they are using false names [Examples include: Angela?, Sam?, Nicole?, Paula?, Lisa?, Joshua?, Ruchi?, Evelyn?, Ellen?, etc. – all fake pseudonyms]. None provides a surname, nor a position title, nor direct contact phone number, nor office address. They all use the generic Service NSW call centre number of 13 77 88. Anyone can email that – they could all be from overseas;
These otherwise anonymous callers/emailers have been shown to be working from home. Any documents you send them go where? Nowhere. From our experience and that of others, there appears no central database record of each grant recipients kept by Service NSW. Phone one of these fraudsters and they state that they have no information of what you provided their colleague previously;
If you receive an invoice on a ‘Customer Service’ letterhead, ignore that since you probably have no agreement with the Department of Customer Service, but only Service NSW and that grant agreement has long concluded;
All “case numbers”, “reference numbers” and “quote numbers” from this mob and from Revenue NSW, and Treasury on this matter are contrived and fake;
If you receive an email from Taverner Research Group claiming to be approved by the NSW Treasury Project Team that asks you to complete a survey and click links don’t click anything. Just delete the email;
Don’t be conned to provide your personal details. Consider the extent of intimidation of the information sought in the example email thread above – rates notes, tax return, accountant’s letter and even demanding, drivers license, passport, even birth and marriage certificates? These low-life mongrels have a bloody hide.
Don’t get into a dispute about the terms and condition of the grant such as terms like ‘Aggregated Annual Turnover’. Solution? – just hang up;
If you get a debt collection notice from Revenue NSW in relation of this grant, write to the following listed below. State that:
1. You and your business fully complied with all eligibility criteria, the spirit and terms and conditions of Service NSW 2021 COVID-19 Micro Business Grant including all requested supporting documentary evidence;
2. Service NSW emailed you confirmation that your application had been duly assessed and approved;
3. Service NSW paid you the grant;
4. That you reject Service NSW subsequent so-called ‘audit’ not as a legitimate financial audit but as a scam;
5. Anonymous individuals purporting to be from Service NSW have failed to provide you with any specific request for supporting documentary evidence that you have not already supplied;
6. That you consider that Service NSW has failed to justify its empty accusation that its grant application eligibility criteria were not met, and that you therefore consider this accusation to be baseless;
7. You consider the treatment by Service NSW callers and emailers to you to be intimidating and actions unconscionable;
8. That you will not be paying such an invalid invoice and that you are prepared to take legal action and to fight this in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
Make a formal complaint to the three executives responsible and accountable for all this scam process. They are as follows by Australia Post Registered Post and including a request for a signature on delivery:

Your local Member of NSW Parliament (phone first to obtain the email address);
Cassandra Gibbens, Executive Director, Business Bureau, Service NSW, GPO Box 7057 SYDNEY NSW 2001;

Cassandra Gibbens – smiling dragon?

Greg Wells Chief Executive Officer, Service NSW (same address);

Greg Wells

The Hon. Jihad Dib MP, Minister for Customer Service and Digital Government, Minister for Emergency Services, and Minister for Youth Justice. Postal Address: GPO Box 5341 SYDNEY NSW 2001. (NOTE: This bloke is the Minster for Service NSW, but with an obscure portfolio title. Premier Chris Minns has allocated him three ministries, so he hasn’t time to even scratch himself. In our experience we wrote to him through our local member, however, his response was merely a regurgitation of the rote of his bureaucrat minions].

Jihad Dib

The Hon. Courtney Houssos, MLC., NSW Minister for Finance and Natural Resources, GPO Box 5341. Sydney NSW 2001. [Note: She is the current minister in charge of Revenue NSW].