The Mail-Times spoke to four people from Horsham, Stawell and Warracknabeal last week who said they had been asked to repay thousands of dollars.

All four believed they had fallen victim to an automated checking system that aimed to crack down on wrongful claims.

Centrelink has sent out more than 169,000 notices since July, but about 20 per cent of the debts have been altered or removed when the recipients provided more detailed financial information.

About $300 million of debt has been created but many have said they do not owe anything.

A Warracknabeal woman was told she owed more than $1700 because tax records showed her children’s father earned too much.

The woman said he had been on unemployment benefits for most of the time in question, but has yet to hear anything else from Centrelink.

A Horsham woman who studied child care in Ballarat was told by Centrelink she must repay $10,000 because she was not eligible for a student allowance.

The woman said her original request for an internal review was denied.

“I have received a confirmation about my appeal through administrative appeal tribunal. My appeal is now on progress,” she said.

One theory is that Centrelink’s system is using tax data to create average fortnightly earnings, which can cause errors if people  worked on and off during the year.

Social Services Minister Christian Porter has defended the system, which he said had identified overpayments and returned money to taxpayers.

A different Horsham woman was asked to pay back more than $700 after she claimed unemployment benefits while between jobs in 2013.

She said Centrelink staff asked her not to start a review.

“I called them a few days ago with the intention of requesting a formal review of my debt as I genuinely do not believe that I owe them any money,” she said. 

“They said to save on time I could just supply Centrelink with copies of my payslips from the period that they claim I was overpaid.”

The woman was told to wait for a letter or MyGov online message to learn whether her debt had been removed or altered.