Companies need to do more to help their customers to complain, says the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) – Te Mana Tātai Hokohoko.

FMA research Why don’t consumers complain? | Financial Markets Authority found fewer than one-third of people are confident that they know how to complain about their financial service provider. Furthermore, those who said they would have liked to complain, but didn’t, cited barriers such as doubts about the outcome, not knowing how to complain, and perceptions of difficulty.

In conjunction with the research, an information sheet Complaints: Ensuring consumers are treated fairly | Financial Markets Authority published today says financial service providers need to ensure consumers know how to complain and how their complaints will be dealt with.

Financial service providers should be visible, easy to complain to, accessible, fair, transparent and proactive when dealing with complaints and should show that lessons learnt from complaints are integrated into their business processes to improve outcomes for all consumers.

FMA Executive Director, Licensing and Conduct Supervision, Clare Bolingford says: “We strongly encourage companies to review their complaints processes to ensure they are easily accessible for consumers and fit for purpose.

“Companies are burying complaints processes deep on their websites, requiring details a customer may not have to hand and treating customers in a defensive and dismissive way.

“The research findings support the FMA’s focus on ensuring complaints processes are accessible, fair, and effective, not only by making it easy to complain, but also by understanding and addressing the reasons some consumers don’t. 

The research also found:

• Almost one in three complaints (31%) go unresolved.
• Of those who wanted to complain but didn’t, 33% thought there was no point complaining because nothing would happen.
• 57% of complainants were satisfied with the handling of their complaint while 21% were dissatisfied with the handling of the complaint.

“Effective complaints and high consumer awareness builds trust and provides firms with opportunities to gain insights to improve their processes and consumer outcomes,” says Clare.

“As New Zealanders are facing increasing financial pressures and rising costs, maintaining consumer confidence in financial services is more important now than ever.”

Complaints are a focus of the Financial Conduct Report, which outlines the FMA’s priorities for the year, as part of “ensuring customers are treated fairly when things go wrong”.

Background:

The research note draws on a 2022 nationwide survey (2,509 respondents) commissioned by the FMA and conducted by Fiftyfive5, alongside relevant data from the FMA’s 2024 Consumer Confidence Survey (2,081 respondents)​ (Financial Markets Authority, 2024; fiftyfive5 and Financial Markets Authority, 2022)​.

Key questions for firms:

• Can you point to how you are set up to resolve complaints, so that customers feel listened to and treated fairly?
• Do you have processes in place to take on board lessons learnt from complaints into your products and services going forward?
• Are your complaints processes well signposted?
• Are customers given the impression that you welcome the opportunity to put things right and understand where to improve?
• Are customers satisfied with the process, was it handled well, communicated well, was it easy to understand, fair and balanced, and is any necessary remediation happening in a timely way?
• Are you looking at the bigger picture of the complaints data you collate? Is it being analysed for systemic issues or recurring pain points with customers? How is that fed back into your decision making?

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