A performance audit into the Office of the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s management of complaints has found the Office to have been largely effective for the past three financial years.
In his report Management of Complaints by the Office of the Commonwealth Ombudsman, Auditor-General Grant Hehir said his examination focused on the effectiveness of the Office’s complaints management processes in relation to Australian Government and private sector entities from 30 June 2018 to 1 July 2021.
“The Office is largely effective in managing complaints directed to it,” Mr Hehir said.
“The Office has fit-for-purpose arrangements in place to support the effective handling of parliamentary and industry complaints,” he said.
“The complaints process is accessible, clear and mostly responsive to the public, and managed in accordance with the Office’s complaints framework.”
Mr Hehir said the Ombudsman’s Office conducted regular reviews of the effectiveness and efficiency of its parliamentary complaints processes and limited reviews of its industry complaints processes.
However, the Auditor-General said the Office’s surveys of complainant and Agency satisfaction did not clearly identify the methodologies used to generate the surveys’ results.
“The Office has recently established processes to monitor the implementation and intended outcomes of action items arising from reviews and is conducting an enterprise level quality assurance framework review,” he said.
“Prior to this, the Office did not consistently monitor the implementation of review findings or measure the success of continuous improvement initiatives.”
Mr Hehir made one recommendation to the Ombudsman’s Office to establish enterprise level monitoring and assurance frameworks to drive improvement.
The Auditor-General’s Report can be accessed at this PS News link and 49-page printable version at this link.
The audit team was Jag Basant, Shane Armstrong, Johanna Bradley, Ewan McPherson, Glen Ewers, Zoe Pilipczyk, Lauren Harmsworth, Peta Martyn and Alex Wilkinson.
