The idea of outsourcing the notoriously complex Medicare payments system to a private or overseas vendor with no experience of what has been labelled its “labyrinthine” structures beggars belief, one of Australia's leading authorities on Medicare billings says.

Margaret Faux, founder and principal of Synapse Medical Services, which provides medical administration and billing services to all levels of healthcare, said the complexities of the Medicare system meant there was no private company that could handle its procedures better than the Department of Human Services can.