External Complaints - Child Support investigations 277-17091400

Scrutinise the enquiry:

• Ministerial response, agency response, Executive correspondence and Parliamentarian written response, go to Step 2
• Media alerts and Media briefs, go to Step 7
• Ombudsman complaint, see the Managing complaints from the Ombudsman table
• Parliamentarian verbal enquiry, Executive Minutes, Waiver brief request, Ministerial and agency brief requests, see the Management of other communication table

If the correspondence is from a complainant with an active ExCCS investigation, go to Step 4

Can the complainant be identified on Cuba?

• Yes, go to Step 5
• No, go to Step 3

Record the complaint on the ExCCS Workbook spreadsheet as a non-customer.

If the complainant has included some contact details, for example phone, email or postal address and complaint contains:

• a risk of self-harm or harm to others discuss with the ExCCS PM before taking further action
• a threat of media escalation, go to Step 7
• no threats:
• if an email address is available but no telephone number, email the complainant requesting further information via the Ministerial mailbox
• if a telephone number is available and/or the complainant’s address, inform the ExCCS Service Officer on allocation. They will decide whether to call the complainant or prepare a general response

Allocate to ExCCS Service Officer as per the allocation principles.

If additional correspondence is received from a complainant with the same or new issues and there is already an active complaint investigation:

• send the new correspondence to the ExCCS Service Officer managing the complaint and copy their Service Support Manager
• seek advice from the ExCCS Service Officer whether to add it to the existing parliamentary document record (PDR) or create a new PDR

Follow the advice the ExCCS Service Officer provides:

• Add the correspondence to the existing PDR:
• refer the correspondence back to MST to add to the existing PDR
• add a note to the View/Add Comments window
• if new issues are raised restart the 10/15 day timeframe
• Do not add the correspondence to the existing PDR, manage as per new correspondence, go to Step 5

If the complaint contains a risk:

• of self-harm and/or harm to others, go to Step 6
• of media escalation threat, go to Step 7

Prepare an email to Social Work Services:

• request an assessment and/or for the customer to be contacted by them
• attach the customer’s correspondence

Note: before sending the email check for Personalised Services (PS) management

Is the customer managed in PS?

• Yes, communicate with the PS Service Officer (PSO) about the referral to a social worker
• If the referral is agreed to, send the email and copy in the PSSO, PS SSM and PS Service Manager
• No, send the social worker email and prepare a PS referral. See Customer Referral Guidelines, Personalised Services

If a request for an assessment on a customer has been sent to Social Worker Services, save a copy of the email in the customer’s Workload folder.

Complete the Customer Incident Reporting Tool (CIRT) as soon as possible. See Customer aggression - Reporting and recording incidents.

The Resources page has a link to the Security Incident Reporting page, which includes information about when and how to complete Security Incident Reports and the Security incident Report Form.

Email the correspondence to the ExCCS SSM in the WA/VIC team, or in the absence of this officer to an ExCCS SSM in another team.

The ExCCS SSM will make a decision about further action, including informing the Media team.

If the Media team considers it necessary they will send a request for a case summary or social media review to ExCCS mailbox for the ExCCS team to action.

The ExCCS SSM will advise which ExCCS Service Officer to allocate the media brief to.

Record allocation on the ExCCS Daily Allocations Spreadsheet.

MST will create all PDR’s relating to Ministerial and Agency responses.

MST forwards all correspondence relating to Child Support including referrals from other Departments to ExCCS for review.

The ExCCS PSO will scrutinize the correspondence to determine if the correspondence contains Child Support service delivery issues that we can answer. If necessary the ExCCS PSO can ask for ExCCS staff to review.

Were Child Support service delivery issues identified?

• Yes, ExCCS PSO will return the correspondence to MST. The MST will create a PDR, and assign back to Unit Co-ordination – External Complaints Child Support position for allocation
• create a step 3 complaint in the Feedback and Review window
• use the Document upload request macro to forward any attachments to the mail handling team for scanning to the View correspondence window. The attachments must be either PDF or TIF format. The completed macro creates an email including the customer's information
• save the email sent to the mail handling team and the incoming correspondence to the ExCCS workload folder on the National share drive
• delete the automatically generated Ministerial Unactioned intray and create a Departmental Response- NMR intray, route to the appropriate ExCCS Service Officer
• assign the PDR to the appropriate ExCCS Service Officer and CC the SSM record on the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet and ExCCS Daily Allocation Spreadsheet
• No, ExCCS PSO will return the correspondence to MST:
• with comments as to why Child Support are not accepting, and
• who would be best placed to respond to the correspondence

• Create a PDR in PDMS, add a copy of the correspondence as an ‘attachment’
• Create a step 3 complaint in the Feedback and Review window
• Use the Document upload request macro to forward any attachments to the mail handling team for scanning to the View correspondence window. The attachments must be either PDF or TIF format
• The completed macro creates an email including the customer's information
• Save the email sent to the mail handling team and the incoming correspondence to the ExCCS workload folder on the National share drive
• Route the Step 3 Complaint intray to the appropriate ExCCS Service Officer
• Assign the PDR to the appropriate ExCCS Service Officer and CC the SSM

Record on the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet and ExCCS Daily Allocation Spreadsheet.

• Record on Cuba in Feedback and Review window as a Step 3 complaint
• Delete Ministerial Unactioned intray and create an MP enquiry intray
• Route intray to the ExCCS Service Officer
• Forward email from Parliamentarian to the ExCCS Service Officer, copy their Service Support Manager. If the customer is managed by Personalised Services (PS) copy the PS Service Officer, their SSM and their SM
• Send any attachments via Document upload request macro for scanning onto customer’s record

Record on the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet and ExCCS Daily Allocation Spreadsheet.

ExCCS Service Officers take Parliamentarian complaints by phone on the Child Support Parliamentarian Advice Line. Once finalised, they email the ExCCS mailbox supplying the following:

• Parliamentarian/Senator's name
• Customer's name
• Customer's Child Support reference number (CSID)
• Category of complaint
• Complaint issues raised
• Date received
• Date finalised

The ExCCS PSO enters this information onto the ExCCS Workbook spreadsheet for reporting purposes.

• Create an Ombudsman enquiry intray as a Step 3 complaint in Cuba
• Copy and paste the section 7a complaint in the Feedback and Review window
• Determine the due date for the ExCCS Service Officer to send the response to their SSM, which is one day before the ORMS due date
• Allocate using the allocation principles and route the Ombudsman unactioned intray to the appropriate ExCCS Service Officer

Note: if the Ombudsman response date is less than 28 days, change the intray due date according to the Section 7a email request

• Email the section 7a complaint to the ExCCS Service Officer, including the due date. Copy in their SSM and ORMS (to acknowledge receipt of request). If the customer is managed by Personalised Services (PS) copy the PS Service Officer and their SSM
• File the allocation email in the ExCCS workload folder on the National share drive

Record the section 7a in the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet.

OCT received by External Complaints Resolution (ECR) mailbox are forwarded to the ExCCS mailbox for allocation:

• Record the OCT in the Feedback and Review window as a Level 2 Complaint
• Route Level 2 Complaint intray to the relevant Service Officer
• Send allocation email to the Service Officer and their SSM. If Personalised Services (PS) is managing the customer copy in the PSO and their SSM, noting contact attempts are to be made within 2 business days

Record the OCT in the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet.

The process of recording section 8 complaints also applies when a section 8 complaint is made on behalf of a customer by a third party who is an unauthorised representative.

• Check the Feedback and Review window to determine if the customer has previously escalated the matter to the Ombudsman
• Create an Ombudsman enquiry as a Step 3 complaint in Cuba
• Copy and paste the section 8 complaint in the Feedback and Review window
• Calculate the due date for the ExCCS Service Officer to send the response to their SSM. This is generally 5 business days before the due date to ORMS
• Allocate using the allocation principles and route the Ombudsman unactioned intray to the appropriate ExCCS Service Officer. Note: if the Ombudsman response date is less than 28 days, change the intray due date according to the section 8 email request
• Email the section 8 complaint to the ExCCS Service Officer, including the due date. Copy in their SSM and ORMS (to acknowledge receipt of request). If the customer is managed by Personalised Services (PS) copy the PS Service Officer, their SSM
• File the allocation email in the ExCCS workload folder on the National share drive

Record the section 8 in the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet.

Some Ombudsman enquiries include questions for other areas of the agency. Unless told otherwise, ORMS will request the information directly from these areas.

• Scrutinise the complaint. If a new Ombudsman reference number is provided a new record must be recorded (go to Step 1), otherwise use the original section 8 complaint Cuba record
• Add a new notepad to the Feedback and Review window under the original Section 8 request with the heading ‘Additional Information request’
• Copy and paste the section 8 additional information request in the Feedback and Review window
• Due date for the ExCCS Service Officer to send the response to their SSM will be the due date provided by ORMS
• Allocate to the ExCCS Service Officer who provided the original response if possible, otherwise use the allocation principles
• Email the section 8 additional information request to the ExCCS Service Officer, including the due date and copy in their SSM, SM and ORMS (to acknowledge receipt of request). If the customer is managed by Personalised Services (PS) copy the PS Service Officer and their SSM
• File the allocation email in the ExCCS workload folder on the National share drive
• Record the Section 8 additional information request on the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet

If the Ombudsman's enquiry relates to a finalised complaint and a new Ombudsman reference number has not been provided:

• add the section 12(4) request to the existing finalised complaint record, and
• create a Section 8 Follow-up intray which reflects the response due date provided by ORMS and allocate to the ExCCS Service Officer who responded to the original section 8
• email a copy of the section 12(4) to the ExCCS Service Officer and copy their SSM, and ORMS. Include in the email:
• internal reference number
• due dates
• record the section 12(4) Finalisation with Comments in the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet

Note: this step can be completed as many times as required if the Ombudsman continues to raise additional questions.

ORMS will consider the ExCCS SSM approved draft response for section 7A, section 8, and section 12(4).

ORMS will ask for clearance for section 7A, section 8, and section 12(4) to provide to the Ombudsman.

Clearance requests will be forwarded to the ExCCS SSM to seek approval by the due date provided by ORMS. The ExCCS SSM will then seek approval from the ExCCS SM and ExCCS NM as required. If the request contains input from External Complaints Resolution Team (ECRT), the ExCCS SSM is to coordinate with ECRT contact for full National Manager approval.

When an email is received from Waiver team:

• create workload folder for customer
• forward the email from the Waiver team to the ExCCS Service Officer and copy all names on the original email from Waiver team in the allocation email
• save a copy of the allocation email in the workload folder
• record allocation of ExCCS Service Officer on the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet

• Record in the Communication window
• Create workload folder
• Record allocation for ExCCS Service Officer on the ExCCS workbook spreadsheet

Email informal brief request to ExCCS Service Officer and their SSM. If the customer is managed in Personalised Services (PS) copy in PS Service Officer and their SSM

• Check the ExCCS Allocation and None intray positions on Cuba every day
• Occasionally potential ministerial correspondence intrays are routed there
• These intrays usually relate to pieces of correspondence which are either:
• from a Parliamentarian who has written directly to the agency’s GPO Box address rather than through the usual channels. Allocate the intray as per the allocation principles
• already allocated to officers. Delete the intrays

• If documents attached to a complaint require uploading, use the Document upload request macro to send the correspondence to the mail team
• Request the correspondence is scanned onto the customer’s View correspondence window
• Save a copy of the email sent to the mail team in the Workload folder

The ExCCS PSO sends weekly reports to the ExCCS SSM requesting they update the spreadsheet.

This report includes all work on hand and where the work is up to, for example:

• currently with SSM
• on track
• waiting for policy

ExCCS PSO uses these dates when completing the spreadsheet:

• Ombudsman, Ministerial, Agency, Executive correspondence and Informal briefs - the date the National Manager approves/clears the response
• Waiver - the date the ExCCS SSM sends the brief to Waiver team as this is deemed approved
• Parliamentarian complaints - contact date recorded in the Feedback and Review window
• Customer Liaison Officer (CLO) enquiries, the date CLO advises the complaint is finalised

When a Service Officer:

• joins the team, the ExCCS SSM notifies the ExCCS mailbox explaining what work types should be allocated to the new officer
• leaves the team, the ExCCS SSM reallocates within their team if possible.