- If it's not a Commission issue, we'll refer you to another agency if we can. (More than a quarter of the enquiries we get are about things we don't deal with.)
- If we need more information from you, we'll contact you, and hold your complaint open for one month to allow you to send us the information.
- If the issue you have complained about potentially breaks one of the laws we enforce, we will review it alongside other recent complaints.
- If we decide that it doesn't in fact break any of the laws we enforce, we'll close the complaint.
If your complaint does raise a possible issue under the laws we enforce:
- We may still decide it doesn't warrant further action at this time. We will close the complaint, but may use the information you provided if we get similar complaints in the future. If we decide not to proceed, we will explain why.
- We may decide the issue warrants further attention and open an investigation.
If we open an investigation:
- Your complaint will be assigned to an investigator.
- The investigator will usually make direct contact with you within two months of your original enquiry.
If the investigation finds the issue you complained about appears to break one of the laws we enforce, there are a number of ways we can deal with it. We will decide what to do based on our enforcement criteria. This could include sending a compliance advice or warning letter to the business involved, entering into a settlement with them or taking them to court.
Your complaint is important to us - but we don't take action on every complaint
We receive about 10,000 complaints and enquiries each year. In deciding whether to open an investigation, we need to consider how widespread, blatant and damaging the issue appears to be. Sometimes following an investigation we are able to achieve financial redress for affected consumers. However we are not a dispute resolution service. You may need to take your own action if you want your individual issue to be resolved, such as getting your money back.
