A Federal Court judge has questioned the ability of the Superannuation Complaints Tribunal (SCT) to properly handle complaints after a matter between Telstra Super and a party linked to one of its members ended in court.
Victorian judge, Justice Gray, used a court judgement to suggest the widow of a Telstra Super member was forced to take legal proceedings against SCT because of the inability of the tribunal to properly manage the complaint.
Earlier this month, the widow of a Telstra Super member took the SCT to court after the tribunal determined her complaint against Telstra Super, stemming from the super fund's refusal to provide paperwork to enable her to recover her husband's superannuation monies, was outside the tribunal's jurisdiction.
After the widow pushed for the tribunal to review her complaint, the SCT still found her complaint was outside its jurisdiction.
"The tribunal failed to afford [the widow] even the most basic of procedural fairness in relation to the documents it obtained from Telstra Super, on which it relied to reject her complaint as being outside the tribunal's jurisdiction," Justice Gray said.
"The picture that emerges from the tribunal chairperson's submissions is one of an institution under-resourced to deal with the number of complaints it receives."
Gray said if attention had been given to legal obligations, and some common sense had been applied, there would have been no need for the widow to launch the proceedings.
The SCT receives around 2500 complaints each year, of which 40 per cent, or about 1100, are outside the tribunal's jurisdiction for various reasons, court documents said.
