Terry Sarten: Transferring super over Tasman hard yakka

PEGGED BACK: Make sure you secure your superannuation - especially if it is coming from Aussie.A-080915NZHGBCASH6

AS MANY of my readers will know, I have been back in New Zealand a bit over a year following a two-year stint in Australia.

I worked as a health service manager for a tertiary children's hospital in Sydney while my wife worked in a health specialist role at another hospital.

It was a great learning experience and, on returning home, we commenced what we thought would be the relatively straightforward transfer of our Australian super funds. There is an agreement between New Zealand and Australia that this can be done, so naturally we thought it would be easy.

We should have noted the warnings when, already back in New Zealand, there were problems getting our rental bond back. It is important to say that the rental company was not at fault - in fact, they helped with unravelling the mystery.

The bond is held by a state government agency. Once the rental has been checked and the bond payment approved, it is returned to the tenant.

In this instance, there was some delay and then a cheque arrived in the mail and we hastened to our bank to deposit the money. A few days later, the bank contacted us to say the cheque had bounced. This came as a huge surprise as it was from the State of New South Wales and it seemed unlikely that they had suddenly gone broke.

We contacted the rental people and they contacted the NSW government bond agency. It turned out that they had made the payment then decided to change it to an electronic transfer and had cancelled the cheque. It was pointed out to them it was us who had incurred the extra costs for their bungling and, although we got no apology, we were pleased to get our money back.

We started to realise we were entering a super saga of mythical dimensions when we asked our banks in Australia and New Zealand what we need to do to get our super transferred. Both banks said we had to talk to the other one and neither seemed to have an idea of what was required.

We contacted the Australian government department that manages the authorisation of such transfers and were sent forms. We filled them in and sent them back. Then there was a message saying we had to do this through the Australian tax website.

We tried that - it said that we had no super funds in Australia despite the fact that they clearly existed in our super accounts, deposited alongside our salaries. So we went back to the super fund who told us that they had changed the process and we needed to provide different documentation.

We sent what we understood constituted the required documentation; proof of identity, passport copies showing our return to New Zealand and relevant bank details, all witnessed, signed and stamped by a local lawyer. Time passed. We got another set of instructions saying a lawyer was not an appropriate witness - it needed to be a Notary Public or a bank officer who had been with the bank for longer than two years. No disrespect to our local bank who were most obliging, but it seemed odd that a bank office outranked a qualified lawyer - we shook our heads at this strange anomaly.

The local bank forwarded the documents to their KiwiSaver Trust who provided us with a letter confirming the legitimacy of our request and we duly send all the paperwork away. Now, just over a year from beginning the process, the money will arrive from Australia in our KiwiSaver accounts. I feel like breaking into a chorus of Waltzing Matilda.

Terry Sarten is a Wanganui-based writer, musician and social worker - feedback: tgs@inspire.net.nz