A young woman says she learned an important lesson after her retirement fund lost 20 years of contributions.
Kate Fowler, from Melbourne, told Daily Mail Australia that her ordeal began in May this year when she was unable to log into her Hostplus account.
When the 35-year-old called the pension fund’s hotline, the customer service agent told her her account “did not exist,” leaving her stomach in knots.
Ms Fowler said her anxiety and panic turned to anger as she waited to speak to a supervisor.
His inbox had dozens of marketing emails from Hostplus and his pay stubs contained contributions made in his name every week, but there was worse news to come.
‘They “He told me the account should have been closed and the funds sent to the ATO,” Fowler said.
‘I knew this wasn’t true because my MyGov account showed the funds were supposed to be in Hostplus and I had a pay stub showing my employer had contributed funds in the past few weeks.
‘For a second I wondered if I was being scammed, but it seemed unlikely because I had called the official Hostplus phone number on the website.’
Kate Fowler (pictured) was left feeling “quite anxious” after being told her 20-year retirement fund “didn’t exist”
Speaking on the phone, Ms Fowler, who has worked at Hostplus since 2009, said she was so angry she “couldn’t even think straight”.
The supervisor told her to put all her information, including her account number, in writing via email so they could confirm her identity.
Then he made a strange discovery.
“They responded with a password-protected document, but the password was supposedly my date of birth and I couldn’t open it,” he continued.
“So I thought that was the problem: they had asked me to prove my identity with my date of birth, and they had one on file that didn’t match.”
It turns out that a second Hostplus account had been opened in Ms Fowler’s name, but her date of birth had been entered incorrectly. At some point, the accounts were merged and the incorrect date of birth remained on file.
Fortunately, all the money was found.
The 35-year-old Melbourne woman said she regularly receives marketing emails from Hostplus, but the customer service representative couldn’t find anything in her name.
“I was a bit surprised because I thought they would check that sort of thing against the ATO records,” he said.
Ms Fowler admitted that until recently she had always “buried her head in the sand” when it came to money.
Now she always wants to know where her hard-earned dollars are going and how her retirement fund is doing.
“The point of this long story is not to get too confident about your retirement. Review it thoroughly at least at rent time, but preferably every quarter,” he said.
‘Make sure you can log in and see your balance, make sure your details are correct and up to date, make sure you’re not being charged for insurance you don’t need.
‘The most important thing is to combine all your funds into one to get the maximum return. This is real money that you will want to have access to when you reach retirement age.
“We should all be informed about where this money goes and how to manage it, especially younger women who want to take charge of their finances.”
A Hostplus spokesperson told the Daily Mail Australia: “Hostplus has worked with the member and this matter has now been resolved. For privacy and security reasons, we are unable to comment further.”
According to UniSuper, women between 35 and 39 years old tend to have an estimated $75,785 for their retirement, while men have $95,937.
The amount varies depending on whether you work full-time or part-time.