FINANCIAL DIFFICULTY ASSISTANCE

Next steps

• Once we have received your completed application form, one of our representatives will contact you to discuss your situation and solutions that may be available to assist you.
  
• You’re not required to provide supporting documents at the time you submit your application. We will inform you if we require supporting documents, examples include but are not limited to bank statements, proof of income and/or medical certificates.

We'll provide an outcome

Once we have received your completed application form, one of our representatives will contact you to discuss your situation and solutions that may be available to assist you.

• If we do not require further information from you, one of our representatives will respond to your application within 21 days.
• If we ask you for more information during this time, we might take a further 21 days after receiving the information to make a decision.
• If you don’t provide us with the requested information, we’ll make our assessment based on the information we have within 28 days of the date we asked for the information.
• Approved application communications will include details of the offer of assistance and any changes to your account contract.

Other Information

• If you have been or are still paying for insurance on your Credit Card account(s) you may be eligible to make a claim with the insurer. Your account statement will indicate the name of the insurer you need to contact. You can still request financial difficulty assistance even if you have an insurance policy.
  
• Your card / account may be suspended from the time we receive your application for financial difficulty assistance, and if approved, during the entire period you’re on financial difficulty assistance. Ability to transact post your financial difficulty assistance will be based on your card or account status.

Financial Hardship
Information (FHI) includes

• The type of financial hardship arrangement you have entered into will depend on whether the changes to the terms of your loan or obligations are permanent or temporary.   
• Variation Financial Hardship Arrangement (V) – indicates that a permanent variation to the terms of the consumer credit contract have been made and will be reported once in the month that the contractual variation took effect. Once the FHI has been reported with a Variation (V), the future RHI will be updated to indicate if the new monthly repayments are being paid on time or not. 
• Temporary relief or deferral Financial Hardship Arrangement (A) – providing temporary relief from or deferral of the individual’s obligations in relation to consumer credit, reported each month that the arrangement is in place.  During the period that any temporary relief or deferral Financial Hardship Arrangement is in place, the RHI will be concurrently reported to indicate whether you are meeting the obligations of your temporary financial hardship arrangement where payments were agreed to be made.

This information will appear on your credit file for 1 year. Only your financial hardship information from licensed credit providers who hold an Australian Credit Licence can be recorded. Telecommunication and utility companies are not licensed credit providers, so your financial hardship information will not include these providers, and they will not be able to see financial hardship information details either.

These changes will also allow licensed credit providers to access and use this comprehensive information in order to make more informed lending decisions. However, this information cannot be used by licensed credit providers to calculate your credit score. For more information, please refer to creditsmart.org.au

For more information on credit reporting please refer to https://virginmoney.com.au/help/privacy-and-security/credit-reporting

You are entitled to a free credit report every three (3) months and you can request one through any of the Credit Reporting Bodies:

Virgin Money Australia Credit Card Licensing Information

Virgin Money Australia, a division of Bank of Queensland Limited ABN 32 009 656 740, Australian Credit Licence 244616 (“BOQ”), promotes and distributes the Virgin Money Credit Cards ("Credit Cards"). National Australia Bank Limited ABN 12 004 044 937 Australian Credit Licence 230686 (“NAB”) is the credit provider and issuer of the Credit Cards. NAB has acquired the business relating to these products from Citigroup Pty Limited (ABN 88 004 325 080, AFSL and Australian Credit Licence 238098) (“Citi”) and has appointed Citi to assist to administer the Credit Cards. 

*Our/us/we means NAB unless the context otherwise requires it. 

BOQ does not and will not guarantee or otherwise support NAB’s obligations under the contracts or agreements connected with the Credit Cards.