The ban on retail chain Urban Rampage entering into credit arrangements involving deductions via Centrepay has been made permanent.

Services Australia suspended Urban Rampage's access to Centrepay arrangements in 2024, after the Australian Securities & Investments Commission issued an interim stop order on February 29, 2024, and a final stop order on April 26 that year, as the company moved to take ASIC to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and potentially launch a legal challenge.

On 20 October 2025, Coral Coast Distributors filed a notice of withdrawal of their application for review, and on 5 November 2025, the Administrative Review Tribunal advised that the review proceeding was dismissed; in effect making the ban permanent.

On Tuesday, Commissioner Alan Kirkland told National Indigenous Times ASIC took the action to apply a final stop order on Urban Rampage "because we had repeated reports from financial counsellors about people landing in financial difficulty because deductions were coming out of their Centrelink payments before they'd even received them".

"What this means is out stop order stands, and consumers will not face being put in those sorts of arrangements that cause harm in the future by Urban Rampage," he said.

"More broadly however, the work we did here helped to inform some of the thinking that Services Australia was doing about changes to the Centrepay regime and it's in the process of rolling out a range of reforms which mean that there will be a lot less businesses on the Centrepay register in the future, Centrepay generally won't be available for household goods, so consumers are even more broadly protected from that sort of harm in the future."

ASIC made the initial interim stop order preventing Coral Coast Distributors (Cairns) Pty Ltd (CCD) from having customers at its Urban Rampage retail stores enter agreements to pay for goods on credit through Centrepay deductions over concerns consumers in CCD's target market were low income recipients of Centrelink benefits, residing in remote Indigenous communities, without access to other forms of credit, and that these consumers are vulnerable, at risk of financial hardship and many may currently be experiencing financial distress.

Consumers' repayments to CCD/Urban Rampage for goods purchased on credit were deducted from their Centrelink income before they received their support payment, carrying the risk they would then be unable to meet essential living expenses. ASIC said at the time it was concerned this deferred deduction arrangement was "inherently unsuitable" for the consumers in CCD's target market and "does not meet their likely needs, objectives and financial situation".

ASIC estimated well over 10,000 customers are impacted. Data at the time showed the Urban Rampage store in Mparntwe/Alice Springs alone signed up over 5,000 customers in the twelve months from 1 December 2022 - 1 December 2023.

Of the ten Urban Rampage stores nationwide, nine were involved in the alleged misconduct: in Broome, Derby, Halls Creek, and Kununurra in Western Australia, Gove/Nhulunbuy, Tennant Creek, Katherine and Mparntwe in the Territory, and Mt Isa in Queensland.

Urban Rampage issued a statement at the time alleging ASIC was running an inherently racist test case of its powers.

"We have said from day one ASIC has been acting in a racist and paternalistic way towards First Nations people, who are largely our customer base, the statement read.

"One only has to read ASIC's reasons - which we have made public - to see none of what they are saying makes any sense. There are no complaints and no findings of unconscionable conduct

"Yet ASIC has banned Centrepay because it thinks our customers are stupid, can't read, nor write and are incapable of making sound financial decisions. This case poses the question on whether ASIC's paternalistic, non-evidence based application of the Corporations Act 2001 violates the Racial Discrimination Act 1975."

In April 2024, Alan Gray, managing director of the Broome-based financial counselling agency Bush Money Mob, said Urban Rampage's claim it was a "lifeline retail network for remote Indigenous communities in rural Australia" was incorrect, and he raised concerns about the higher prices he'd observed at Urban Rampage.

"In Broome, where I live, there is an Urban Rampage store but there is also a Best and Less store, a Kmart, and a Red Dot shop, all selling very similar clothing... and household items like Urban Rampage," he said.

"There are also several op shops in Halls Creek, Derby and Nhulunbuy, where I have also worked... there are other shops selling similar products.

"I have extensive first-hand experience with Urban Rampage, and I remain just as alarmed about their business model and operating methods today, as when I first encountered them many years ago."