A federal government agency has been forced to apologise after it “shockingly” asked Centrelink staff to help minimise contact with vulnerable customers in order to reduce “potential customer aggression”.
In an email sent to staff, Sandy Mamo, a general manager of customer delivery at Services Australia, heralded the beginning of the “vulnerable customers innovation challenge” by calling for proposals from workers that would be whittled down by an internal staff vote.
Staff were asked to respond to the question: “How might we serve our vulnerable customers to minimise their need to contact the agency, thereby reducing potential customer aggression?”
The agency – which is responsible for Centrelink, Medicare and child support services – is said to have faced a major backlash over the challenge, which was launched last week. It has since apologised for how it was worded.
The Community and Public Sector Union national president, Alistair Waters, said it appeared Services Australia was “more concerned with removing access for complex clients”.
“Our members at Services Australia are dedicated to ensuring all clients, especially vulnerable clients, have access to the help and services they need, which is why they were so shocked by this memo that came out last week,” he said.
“We should be focused on how to provide better accessibility, not trying to stop access from vulnerable clients at all. It’s absolutely true that members face hostility and aggression at work. But it’s just disingenuous to label vulnerable clients as the sole or key cause of that.”
Waters said that instead of spending time and money creating barriers to access, the agency and the government should invest in additional resources and specialty staff “to allow better access”.
Hank Jongen, a spokesman for Services Australia, apologised for the message.
“The wording to describe the innovation challenge was poor and we apologise unreservedly,” he told Guardian Australia.
“We have a responsibility to ensure the safety of staff and customers and we will continue to involve our workforce in identifying ways to deter inappropriate behaviour occurring in our public shopfronts.”
The agency is now revising the innovation challenge.
Services Australia has embarked on an expansion of its digital services over the past few years, a push that has coincided with a reduced demand for face-to-face services from customers. At the same time, some shopfronts have been slated to close.
Guardian Australia revealed late last year that waiting times at Centrelink offices have increased in recent years, though the agency says that other services, such as phone line waiting times, have improved significantly.
The agency lauded its internal innovation challenge initiative in its 2020 annual report, saying it sought to identify “what we could do better for our staff” and had seen 800 ideas put forward by staff.
It’s understood the innovation challenge program is generally supported by staff and had not caused issues until now.
Last year, the federal government reached a $1.2bn settlement with a class action into the robodebt scandal. In claims, which were not tested by the federal court, the firm leading the action, Gordon Legal, stated Services Australia staff were often contacted by highly distressed debt recipients as a result of the program.
