To deliver on our commitments, AFCA depends on strong relationships with external stakeholders, including consumer groups, industry bodies, regulators, and government. These connections help us drive change and improve dispute resolution and industry practices. Our engagement aligns with our organisational values. We commit to:

• purposeful and targeted engagement
• clearly identifying who we engage with
• proactive engagement, not just when we need support
• managing our reputation in the broader external environment.

Who we engage with

AFCA engages with a diverse range of stakeholders, from service users to those interested in our role in industry reform.

We proactively collaborate with financial firms, industry and government to share insights and information to raise industry standards and practices.

We also regularly work with consumer advocates, including financial counsellors, community lawyers and financial capability workers.

We regard stakeholder feedback as crucial for providing the best possible service. Our broad engagement program includes forums, liaison groups, one-on-one meetings, events, consultations, webinars, newsletters and social media.

Engagement with members

To enhance our service, industry practices and to reduce disputes, we collaborate closely with our members, engaging with both their complaint handling units and senior leadership, including Boards and executives. This year, we regularly met with the Boards of major banks, insurers and others to share insights about what we were seeing and discussed key issues like scams, delays and rising complaint volumes. Additionally, we invited members to participate in consultations, webinars and forums.

Membership services

AFCA has a dedicated team that assists firms with the management of their membership including new member applications, changes to existing memberships, member portal assistance and everyday member enquires.

Member Forum

In 2023-24, AFCA held two Member Forums, in November 2023 and March 2024. These events included dedicated sessions on banking and finance, small business, superannuation, life insurance, general insurance, and investments and advice.

We saw strong participation numbers and positive engagement with these online events.

Member news

We regularly publish news about AFCA, dispute resolution, and the financial services industry on our member portal. Each month a newsletter digest of the latest news is sent to more than 35,000 subscribers.

Engagement with consumers

AFCA’s Community Engagement team plays a crucial role ensuring we listen to a wide array of voices and foster accessibility and trust. This team manages AFCA’s outreach program and consumer engagement efforts, supporting both internal and external networks of trusted advisers. These advisers help us stay informed about emerging issues, offer valuable insights, and contribute to our ongoing service improvement.

AFCA Consumer Advisory Panel

AFCA’s Consumer Advisory Panel (ACAP), consisting of 11 members, met quarterly with our Senior Leadership Group. The panel provided insights and analysis on AFCA’s strategy, policy, and consumer-focused projects, and shared real-time information about the financial challenges Australians faced. Topics discussed by ACAP this year included scams, financial abuse, poor debt collector conduct insurers’ responses to 2022 flood claims and the Independent Review of the General Insurance Code of Practice.

Peter Kell assumed the role of Independent Chair of ACAP in June 2024. He became only the second Chair of the ACAP since its establishment in March 2019. Mr Kell is a former Deputy Chair of the ASIC, a former Deputy Chair of the ACCC, and a former Chief Executive of consumer group Choice.

AFCA thanks outgoing Chair Peter Gartlan for his commitment and service in the role over the past five years.

Consumer Advocate Liaison Meetings

Representatives from nearly 30 advocacy, financial counselling, and community legal services met quarterly with our senior management team. AFCA’s Consumer Advocate Liaison Meetings (CALM) focus on promoting best practices in EDR, removing barriers for vulnerable individuals accessing our services, and examining specific areas of AFCA’s jurisdiction, including fairness, systemic issues, and scams. Participants also contributed their experiences and insights on managing challenging behaviours and supporting victim-survivors of domestic violence.

We are deeply grateful for the time, wisdom, and dedication of everyone involved in ACAP and CALM.

Outreach

Face-to-face interactions remain the gold standard for engagement, fostering trust and deepening connections within the communities we serve.

In the last financial year, we participated in

56 outreach events, reaching culturally and linguistically diverse groups, people with disabilities and their carers, LGBTQIA+ individuals, as well as older Australians.

A highlight included our outreach team travelling to Geraldton area in Western Australia to support a regional outreach program led by Ombudsman WA.

Over three days, the team, along with colleagues from Ombudsman WA, the Health and Disability Services Complaints Office, the Equal Opportunities Commission and Consumer Protection WA, attended free drop-in sessions where locals could come to get help with a range of complaints. The team also attended an information session for Aboriginal Elders on Wednesday.

The trip included a visit to the Greenough Regional Prison where the team met with the superintendent, key staff and peer support prisoners.

Other key events we participated in:

• Yabun Festival
• Sydney Royal Easter Show’s 2UE Senior’s Day
• National Multicultural Festival in Canberra
• Midsumma Carnival
• Financial Counselling Australia Conference in Perth
• Financial Counselling Victoria 2024 Summit
• South Australia and Northern Territory Financial Counselling Conference 2023
• Care Expo Sydney
• Gold Coast Disability Expo
• South West Disability Expo
• My Future My Choice Geelong Disability Expo
• STOP Domestic Violence Conference
• No Woman Left Behind Conference
• Transgender Victoria Trans and Gender Diverse Job Fair
• Council on the Ageing Northern Territory Seniors Expo
• Bring Your Bills days.

These efforts have greatly enhanced awareness of AFCA and reinforced our commitment to inclusivity and support for all Australians.

Engagement with the Government

AFCA actively engaged with the Australian Government throughout the year, addressing a broad spectrum of issues and providing valuable insights on key challenges. By sharing our complaints data and insights with Ministers and departments, we highlighted key challenges impacting both consumers and financial firms.

In addition to our ongoing meetings with Treasury, this year AFCA also met with the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics and appeared before the Senate Estimates Committee to discuss our work and the broader financial landscape.

Our contributions addressed initiatives for tackling the harm from scams, regulatory reform for BNPL services, proposed amendments to the Banking Code of Practice, and insurers’ responses to the 2022 major floods claims, among other topics.

We accepted invitations to appear before Senate Estimates and the Parliamentary Joint Committee, taking the opportunity to discuss aspects of our work with parliamentarians.

International engagement

Gaining insights from global ombudsman schemes and financial services industry members allows us to strengthen and benchmark Australia’s dispute resolution landscape. Our international engagement also gives us a platform to share our expertise, experiences, and successes with overseas counterparts.

AFCA continues its active participation as a member of the International Network of Financial Services Ombudsman Schemes, and our Lead Ombudsmen remain members of the Australian and New Zealand Ombudsman Association.

Key highlights of our international engagement in 2023-24 included meeting with delegates from the Monetary Authority of Singapore, the Indonesia Banking Development Institute, the Financial Services Authority of Indonesia, dispute resolution experts from China, the Financial Ombudsman Service in the UK, and the Financial Industry Disputes Resolution Centre in Singapore.

Social media

We use social media to engage with consumers about the work we do, the types of complaints we consider and how to lodge a complaint if they have a dispute with their financial firm. We also use social media to communicate with members and other financial industry stakeholders.

As at 30 June 2024, we had 2,732 Twitter (now known as X) followers, 3,969 Facebook page followers and 23,897 LinkedIn followers.

Website

The AFCA website contains information about AFCA and our service, including the types of complaints we consider, updates and the steps to lodge a complaint.

From 1 July 2023 to 30 June 2024, the AFCA website had 854,005 unique visitors and 3,665,470 total page views.

Consultations

AFCA regularly seeks input from our stakeholders through public consultations. These consultations are open to all, and we encourage our stakeholders to share their views on changes to our policies, jurisdiction, and other important matters.

We conducted four consultations this year:

• Consultation on AFCA’s Approach to determining compensation in complaints against Financial Advice Firms where the Responsible Entity of a Managed Investment Scheme has become insolvent
• Consultation on AFCA’s Responsible Lending Approach
• Consultation on AFCA’s Appropriate Lending to Small Business Approach
• Consultation on Annual Approach document schedule for financial year 2024-25.

We thank everyone who contributed to our consultations for their valuable feedback.

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