{"id":266138,"date":"2026-02-03T21:48:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T21:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/266138\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T21:48:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T21:48:09","slug":"dying-is-hard-to-do-cancer-sufferer-says-kiwisaver-withdrawal-bar-too-high-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/266138\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Dying is hard to do\u2019: Cancer sufferer says KiwiSaver withdrawal bar too high"},"content":{"rendered":"

He said researching what was involved in a hardship application for KiwiSaver<\/a> was \u201cso discouraging\u201d that it did not make sense to go through it and be rejected.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got limited time and fighting with someone that\u2019s holding my money and refusing to give it up is just one more stress I can\u2019t afford.\u201d<\/p>\n

He pointed to a case that was dealt with by Financial Services Complaints Ltd, in which a woman wanted to withdraw her money early.<\/p>\n

She too had incurable cancer and was not expected to reach 65.<\/p>\n

She applied on the basis of serious illness but was declined because the supervisor for the scheme said she did not meet the criteria because she was expected to live at least another 12 months.<\/p>\n

She argued it was unfair because she was not going to need the money for retirement. She said it was also unfair to say she was able to work because she was sacrificing time with her family to do so.<\/p>\n

FSCL said the decision to decline her application was reasonable given that she did not face an imminent risk of death, which was determined as likely to happen in the next six to 12 months.<\/p>\n

Christopher said he had lost his job as a public servant and had eight months without work before he found a contract role that lasts until June.<\/p>\n

\u201cDifferent kinds of cancer have different effects. Pancreatic cancer for example, is extremely painful and quite brutal. I\u2019ve got bowel\/colon cancer so the immediate first-order effects are moderate in comparison. However, things like the side-effects of chemo, the fact that treatment is two days out of five working days … it\u2019s a lot for an employer to be willing to deal with. Those two days are strictly for the treatment\/chemo infusion. The next day \u2026 it\u2019s hard to even get out of bed. For me, that\u2019s every other week.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd that\u2019s not even going into the various side effects of the medication, like puking, hyper-sensitivity to cold, brain fog and so forth.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven when I move, I\u2019m super slow compared to a few months ago \u2026 Future contracts mean I have to disclose my diagnosis and hope that doesn\u2019t mean I lose the contract to someone that doesn\u2019t have cancer.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said living in Wellington with a mortgage and two kids meant that he had to work.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got two or three years where I\u2019ll be able to essentially function but … living ain\u2019t easy. And dying is surprisingly hard too, it seems. Instead of being able to spend time with the family, I\u2019m either working or sleeping.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the system should change.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn theory, it\u2019s my money. The Government is apparently confident enough in my ability to manage it and get good returns, that they\u2019ve cut the amount they\u2019re willing to match.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd yet trying to actually do something with it, people are treated as if they\u2019re applying for a loan and have to justify it to the bank\/service provider. I understand that there needs to be rules to prevent people withdrawing it willy-nilly but when you\u2019re talking about someone literally dying … I think it\u2019s a bit ridiculous.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t deserve to actually enjoy the couple of remaining years of good life that I have and instead have to wait until I\u2019m knocking on the hospice door, before they\u2019ll reluctantly agree that they guess they can release my money? It feels like the banks\/service providers consider it to be their money and it\u2019s massively inconvenient for them when we need access to it. With the amount of profits the banking sector has turned in over the last few years, it\u2019s kind of hard to swallow that these rules are in place just for my own good.\u201d<\/p>\n

David Callanan, general manager of corporate trustee services at Public Trust, said he was sorry to hear about Christopher\u2019s situation. He said while he could not speak about a specific case, in general people could apply to withdraw money under significant hardship or serious illness criteria.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder a serious illness application, people may meet criteria for \u2018imminent risk of death\u2019 as stated by law, allowing a full withdrawal of their KiwiSaver investment. <\/a>The Financial Services Council\u2019s guidelines<\/a> interpret this as the person being diagnosed with a terminal illness with 18 months or less to live.<\/p>\n

\u201cHowever, supervisors and providers are encouraged to take a common sense approach and the supervisor assesses each application individually.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs part of the withdrawal application, the person will need a doctor or nurse practitioner to complete a declaration form confirming their illness. This form asks the medical practitioner to give a detailed description of their patient\u2019s condition and attach any supporting evidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder a serious illness withdrawal application, a person may meet criteria to withdraw if they are totally and permanently unable to work due to their illness. This could allow them to access a full or partial withdrawal, or one-off costs.<\/p>\n

\u201cA person can also apply to withdraw on significant financial hardship grounds. In most cases, this could allow them to access an amount equivalent to up to 13 weeks of living expenses, including any one-off costs. We encourage people to speak to their KiwiSaver provider in the first instance to discuss early withdrawal options.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He said researching what was involved in a hardship application for KiwiSaver was \u201cso discouraging\u201d that it did…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266139,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[17181,2534,6309,42834,813,6098,42,2959,185,6964,43,312,151686,812,61,6173,40,38,41,39,26179],"class_list":["post-266138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-bar","tag-cancer","tag-do","tag-dying","tag-edmunds","tag-hard","tag-headlines","tag-high","tag-is","tag-kiwisaver","tag-news","tag-says","tag-sufferer","tag-susan","tag-to","tag-too","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-withdrawal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}