Grant Recipients wise to close their grant bank account and set up a new business account

[Disclaimer:  Information provided in this article and elsewhere on this blog and website is not professional advice (financial, accounting, business, legal), but rather the opinion of Nature Trail from our business life experiences.  The information provided is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be personal financial advice.  There’s an inherent risk involved with financial decisions and the website owner will not be held liable for decisions others make.  Readers should otherwise seek professional advice from a qualified financial professional such as a qualified public accountant, specialist lawyer and/or business advisor].

Relevant Background

During a 12-month period [11-April 2023 to 30 April 2024] Nature Trail copped various anonymous Service NSW criminal scammers on-and-off by phone and email hounding  Nature Trail’s Tour Director, Steve, about accusation of default “fraud” and dodgy fabricated retrospective grant ineligibility under the guise of a so-called ‘audit’, and threatening to clawback the entire received grant amount of $15214.

It was no bloody audit.  It was dodgy extortion – a baseless intimidating attempt to try to convert the previously assessed, approved and paid out grant of 2021 into some contrived debt, to then debt collect and to extort one’s family assets.  A bloody scam!

During that awful intimidating period, it occurred to Steve as a business person that should Service NSW escalate its extortionate tactics to self-impose some form of illegal ‘Garnishee Order‘ on Nature Trail’s finances (i.e. try to steal the $15214 grant money back), that Steve decided as a precaution to proactively close the very bank account which he had originally provided details about (Bank Name, Branch Name, BSB, Account Number) to Service NSW at the time of his original grant application [back on 1 August 2021].

So Steve contacted his bank, closed that bank account and immediately setup a new replacement business bank account at the same local branch but having a different bank account number.  He wasn’t about to inform the shysters at Service NSW.

That bank account change necessitated Steve immediately updating his business banking administration records – in his business accounting system, invoicing, update his suppliers accordingly, and change any direct debits he had set up (though which he didn’t have).

As it eventually turned out, fortunately Steve won his battle against Service NSW’s grant clawback scam.  He received an email (as in in writing) formally terminating the scam from the bastards.  They went back into their hole and didn’t end up issuing him with any ‘Garnishee Order‘ or illegitimate ‘Debt Recovery Action‘ by Revenue NSW (aka ‘State Revenue’).

[A garnishee order for debts is a court order that allows one party to recover the judgment debt from the other party’s bank account or someone else who owes the other party money.  It has to be a court order.   But beware that Revenue NSW has wide ranging legislative powers under the New South Wales State Debt Recovery Act 2018.  So may be the bastards can circumvent the courts, we don’t know, since we are not lawyers to know about the details of this.]

On reflection, it had been a wise precautionary move to mitigate the uncertainty and financial risk that Steve’s micro business faced at the time.

It was as if Steve had the $15,214 sitting idle in his bank account by any means.  Like many other locked down businesses during the NSW Government mandatory pandemic lockdown regime [2020-2022] Nature Trail’s business was denied any trade, any customers, any revenue.  Turnover had fallen 100% to zero as an immediate and direct consequence of the NSW Government’s lockdown mandate.

So that grant funding in 2021 became a vital financial lifeline to stay solvent and pay basic bills, including critical mortgage repayments.  We weren’t the only ones suffering during this socio-economic recession.

So by the subsequent time (2023-2024) of Service NSW clawback scam, most of that lifesaving $15214 had nearly all been spent on keeping the business afloat and there was no cash left to even consider paying some contrived debt scam by the same government department that had paid it.

Steve’s business assets for Nature Trail was only his tour vehicle, the hiking gear and equipment and copious touring research records that frankly would have precious little re-sale value.

The clawback threat to Nature Trail was existential – paying the money that he didn’t have in the business would have had to only come from Steve’s family’s home mortgage.  Doing so would have unquestionably sent Nature Trail to the wall but also risked Steve’s family losing their home.   It was never going to bloody happen!!

Steve through his battle with Service NSW, quickly escalated the matter up the Service NSW food chain lodging a formal complaint to CEO Greg Wells, which was subsequently ignored.  So Steve then went political, seeking support from his local member of NSW Parliament.  Also, Steve went public, setting up his dedicated online campaign he rather controversially entitled ‘Government Indian Givers‘ within his community blog ‘Mountains Drums‘ on the Nature Trail website.   This online campaign has sought to expose this scam, sharing his experiences with Service NSW to affected other small businesses and suggest options to deal with the intimidation.

Over the past year Steve’s online campaign has gained traction from hundreds of online readers.  Many small business owners copping the wrath of Service NSW clawback extortion have reached out to Steve on his website directly.

Steve, having gone through a year of this intimidation and financial threat, remains empathetic to similar others copping this unconscionable behaviour by this government department.  Steve continues to welcome anyone so affected to make contact with him (details easily found on this website) and to continue to support business owners to win this battle against Service NSW extortion – it is unprecedented, yet comparable to Centrelink’s immoral and deadly Robodebt Scandal of 2016-2018.

Steve’s campaign battle against Service NSW’s extortion shall prevail until Service NSW ultimately pulls its arrogant and criminal head in and publicly and permanently abandons its criminal clawback scam.

Our proactive guidance to others still copping Service NSW Extortion

From our experience in dealing with Service NSW, we consider Service NSW to be a criminal organisation engaging in criminal extortion in the matter.  In our opinion, Service NSW is not to be trusted or relied upon in any way.

We remind Grant Recipients that Service NSW has since August 2024 embarked upon an unscrupulous tactic of automatically invoicing many grant recipients to repay the entire grant funding it paid out.

To this end, Service NSW is operating cahoots with Revenue NSW, as observed from our receipt of copies of many fabricated invoices being a hybrid of Service NSW, Customer Service and Revenue NSW – the Minns Mafia!

Part of the tactic is to threaten taking money from bank accounts or wages, seizing goods or property etc as part of this joint fabricated and extortionate ‘Debt Recovery Action’…

Since Steve’s online blog started in May 2023, it has transpired that similar other micro grant recipient businesses have not been so fortunate.

The departmental culture of the Service NSW scammers grant clawback is to go for  perceived targeted ‘low hanging fruit’ of micro (family-based) business owners, underestimatedly perceived as easy victims, so vulnerable and ready for the taking.

So, with regards to the Grant Recipients still copping Service NSW Extortion, Steve considers it wise for each to promptly transfer the deposited balance out of the bank account used to receive the grant and into another bank account, then close that grant bank account.  Obviously don’t inform Service NSW.

However, this action is not a bullet-proof safeguard solution, moreso a wise step to start protecting your business cash from initial dodgy unauthorised transactions by Service NSW scammers.

Best to first check with your bank and perhaps shop around for other banking options, including distributing funds across different bank accounts.

Be aware of the risk that by simply transferring funds out of the bank account used to receive the grant funding, that if Service NSW manages somehow to steal the invoice balance out of you bank account a put it into an overdrawn negative balance.

This would mean one would then own one’s own bank.  So quickly check with your bank to ensure that the grant bank account cannot go into an overdrawn negative balance should Service NSW manage to try this tactic.