Legal Aid

  • Legal Aid WA increases services to Western Australians experiencing hardship because of COVID-19
  • More appointments available in areas including employment law, mortgage hardship, elder abuse, consumer protection, credit and debt and financial hardship
  • Additional resources allocated to respond to increase in family violence across WA 
  • Specialist immigration law advice is also available to anyone residing in Western Australia on a temporary visa, such as a partner visa, who is experiencing family and domestic violence.
  • More information can be found at https://www.legalaid.wa.gov.au or by calling the Legal Aid Infoline on 1300 650 579. 

Credit Corp

  • Have suspended interest accrual across their entire purchased debt portfolio from 1 April 2020 for three months.
  • From 1 April 2020, they have also ceased placing default listings on customer credit files for a period of three months.
  • They have issued communications to all existing customers on flexible repayment arrangements discussing the interest freeze and providing the option for them to vary their arrangement through their online self-service area.
  • They have discontinued the commencement of new legal action on any account and the progression to enforcement action on existing matters.

Lion Finance Portal for Financial Counsellors

Lion Finance (Collection House) Portal for FC’s

Financial Counsellors can access their portal to assist clients quicker and easier

Car registration

The economic stimulus package freezes fee increases but you will still need to pay your vehicle licence (rego).

The bad news is you still have to pay your vehicle licence (rego) fees for both this year and next year. The freeze means there will be no increases to your motor vehicle licence fees which were set to rise 1 July this year with inflation. Great news for your budget as your bill next year will be the same as the one you received from us this year.

Council Rates

There is no state response as  to how Local governments are responding to those in Financial hardship during this COVID- 19 crisis.  Each local government as a separate entity and as such are  dealing with their responses differently.  If you are in financial difficulty with rates payments look up your local government  and contact them with your circumstances. There may also be information available on their website.

What we know is there are different options for assisting, some local governments have hardship policies, some are responding to those in hardship with the ceasing of interest on outstanding debts,  some ensuring payments can be completed fortnightly, others are not increasing the rates due in 1 July 2020. There are many options. 

You will need to find out what assistance is available to you from your local government.  If you need assistance you can contact a  financial counsellor  in you area or call the National Debt Helpline on 1800 007 007.