Nine years of bad data costs super fund

A superannuation fund which provided a member with the wrong account balance information for nearly a decade has been ordered to compensate the woman for more than $67,000 to cover the cost of cruises she took with her terminally ill husband, which she might otherwise not have taken.

The Superannuation Complaints Tribunal (SCT) has held that the woman would not have undertaken the $67,348 expenditure on the cruises if she had been accurately acquainted with how much was actually held in her superannuation account.

The SCT had been told that the superannuation fund member had been provided with inaccurate data about her account balance between 2004 and 2013 because of an information technology fault which had not taken account of an earlier lump sum payment made to her.

It was told that the woman had received the inaccurate account balance data despite having made a series of inquiries about the accuracy of the information between 2009 and 2013.

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The woman had sought compensation from the fund claiming to have been misled by the Trustee and seeking for her account to be re-credited with $154,919.99 in accordance with the earlier statements that had been provided to her.

She claimed that expenditure she had undertaken on house renovations and travel would not have been undertaken if she had been properly aware of her account balance.

However the SCT held that fair and reasonable compensation should not extend to expenditure that the complainant would have incurred in any event, had the incorrect benefit statements not been provided to her.

"It is the tribunal's view that expenditure such as repairs and maintenance of a residence is expenditure that is ordinarily incurred and is not necessarily incurred in reliance on an incorrect benefit statement," the SCT said. "Similarly, borrowings from friends and family members for expenses incurred while the complainant's husband was ill and whilst she was looking after him are liabilities that would have been incurred regardless of whether the incorrect benefit statements had been provided."

It said that the travel expenditure was different, stating that it would not have been incurred had the complainant known what her correct superannuation benefit was.

"In the view of the Tribunal, this expenditure, therefore, amounts to the Complainant having altered her financial position to her detriment, in reliance on the incorrect benefit statements provided to her by the trustee," the SCT determination said.