Health Insurance Fairdeal - mistakes on the application process

Hi,

I was making some enquiries about the fairdeal scheme, and was told that if some (financial) material fact was missing from an application (e.g. deposit or other asset was not reported) then the application would have to be reassessed; if it was found that the fairdeal was contributing too much per week, then the "missing" amount would have to be paid up.
It came up in the context of having to deal with the complicated financial affairs of an incapacitated relative, and possibly not knowing an account exists and therefore not reporting it until it was later found - I asked what would happen in that scenario, as I am quite nervous making a mistake in the application process.

Would there be a penalty associated with such a scenario?

It got me thinking though - could the fairdeal scheme find out about such a situation by another means (before I do)? If the relative dies, does the fairdeal get access to their financial affairs to verify the application?

thanks.

Your questions are answered in the two paragraphs at the bottom of page 6 on the application form:

http://www.hse.ie/eng/services/list/4/olderpeople/nhss/AppForm.pdf

All you can do is apply in good faith with the financial information that you have, it’s only an offence if you knowingly give false or misleading information.

If A/c’s or other assets appear after your relative passes away the HSE will know and any overpayment made by the HSE will have to be repaid, but that should not be a problem, it will just reduce the estate value by that amount.