CHAPTER 7 | problem areas in government decision making

Giving advice

The accuracy or quality of agency advice—oral advice particularly—is a recurring theme in many of the case studies and the discussion elsewhere in this report. Typical complaints received by the office during the year were those alleging incorrect advice about how the assets test affects eligibility for social service benefits, whether a voluntary cessation of work to undertake university study will lead to a reduction in child support payments, the requirements to be met for a visa of a particular subclass, and the tax treatment of eligible termination payments.

The issues on which people turn to government agencies for advice can be matters of great importance in how they structure their lives and finances. They can also be complex issues, on which people rely heavily on agencies for correct advice. When the advice is given orally, and—as it increasingly is—by a call centre officer, the difficulty of the issue is apparent.

Dealing with complaints about inaccurate advice is similarly challenging for the Ombudsman's office. It is necessary first to resolve whether inaccurate advice was given. This can be especially difficult if the advice was given orally, if there is no written record, or if there are conflicting written accounts kept by the complainant and the agency.

There is also the issue of remedy. In some cases it is possible to unscramble the problem, and to put the complainant in the position they would have been in had accurate advice been given (or understood). At other times an apology will suffice. In more serious cases there may be irremediable detriment to a person who has followed advice, and questions of compensation or remission of penalties will need to be addressed. It then becomes all the more important to clarify just what was said and when and by whom.

'The development of appropriate strategies has been a central concern of the Ombudsman's office, shared by agencies.'

Disputes about the accuracy of advice will never go away, but they can be minimised. The development of appropriate strategies has been a central concern of the Ombudsman's office, shared by agencies. The issue was earlier taken up by this office in the publication Oral Advice—Clients Beware; it will be a topic of renewed attention in 2004–05.

We accept that it is not always feasible to keep a written record of all advice, particularly advice of a general nature given by a call centre handling millions of calls each year. Nevertheless, we revisit this issue regularly with agencies, and generally take a hard-headed approach in querying whether it is as difficult as sometimes claimed to make a brief contemporaneous written record. Electronic coding of the nature or category of advice given is one way of partly addressing the issue.

Other strategies adopted by agencies can also be effective in minimising difficulty. One is to have supplementary written information such as brochures and pro forma letters that can be sent to inquirers, who can then reconsider or confirm their understanding of an issue. Another approach is to adopt greater caution in giving oral advice, and to alert a person to the need to explore other means and sources of advice (such as written publications, a professional adviser, or the tax ruling system). Yet another strategy noted in the Ombudsman's 2003 report into complaint handling by the Australian Taxation Office is the 'one plus one' policy. If a tax officer cannot resolve a taxpayer's inquiry in the first instance, rather than simply passing them on to someone else, the tax officer makes contact with other tax officers on behalf of the complainant to identify a person who can respond to the inquiry.