3 January 2020
Australians affected by the catastrophic bushfires across parts of Australia are encouraged to contact their bank to access a wide range of available assistance.
Acting CEO of the Australian Banking Association (ABA), Vanessa Beggs, said over the past few months bank hardship teams have been working with communities impacted by natural disasters, offering customers a range of services including deferred loan repayments, waiving fees and charges and restructuring of existing loans.
“It’s hard to truly comprehend the grief and devastation that communities and individuals have experienced, through one of the worst bushfire seasons that Australians have ever known. Banks stand ready to support their customers through these very difficult times.
“Banks have hardship teams that are ready to assist customers affected by natural disasters such as these, offering help which can include deferring loan repayments, waiving fees and consolidating debt to make it more manageable,” she said.
ABA member banks offer a range of services to help customers affected by bushfires or other circumstances outside their control. These can include:
- A deferral of scheduled loan repayments
- Waiving fees and charges, including break costs on early redemption of Farm Management Deposits
- Debt consolidation to help make repayments more manageable
- Restructuring existing loans free of the usual establishment fees
- Deferring interest payments on a case-by-case basis
- Offering additional finance to help cover cash flow shortages
- Deferring upcoming credit card payments
- Increasing emergency credit card limits.
Small businesses affected by these bushfires are also encouraged to contact their bank to access various forms of assistance to help them through the recovery.
For more information, or to find the number for your bank’s hardship team go to dev2.ausbanking.ds1.pensoagency.com/doingittough.
Contact: Rory Grant 0475 741 007
Latest news
E&OERadio InterviewABC Radio Sydney29 July 2026 Topics: ASIC report into offset accounts Thomas Oriti: Do you have an offset account? I think most people with a mortgage do. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s an account that’s linked to your mortgage and it saves you interest. So, I’ll give you an example…. Read more »
E&OETV InterviewABC News29 July 2026. Topics: ASIC report into offset accounts Ros Childs: Borrowers are being advised to check if they have paid more interest than they should following an ASIC review. The two-year review conducted by the corporate watchdog has found weaknesses in how eight banks monitored and managed offset accounts, resulting in borrowers… Read more »
E&OETV InterviewDoorstop29 July 2026 Topics: ASIC report into offset accounts Journalist: Simon, what’s your reaction to the report from ASIC today? Simon Birmingham: ASIC’s report is really important and it’s welcomed by the banking industry. This report shows that in well over 99 per cent of cases, mortgage offset accounts are working exactly they should… Read more »