How we help you
Our complaints process
Initial contact
Contact us by phone, email or live chat and we can give you some guidance on how you can resolve your complaint about your water, electric or gas company.
Complaint unresolved
If 20 days has passed and it’s not sorted, we can get involved. We will work with you and the company to try and get it sorted.
Formal investigation
If we need to, we will undertake an investigation to find out what went wrong, and what to do to fix it. We might need to look more closely at the issues and arrange a meeting to get it sorted.
Commissioner's decision
If the complaint is still not resolved the Commissioner can issue a written decision. The decision is binding on the company, but not you unless you agree to it.
Initial contact
We assist you to resolve your complaint
Contact us about your complaint:
We take one or more of the following actions:
Connect you with your provider
We connect you with the right people so you can talk directly with your provider. We can also ask your provider to call you about your complaint.
Prepare a complaint summary
For more complicated complaints we draft a summary of your complaint for you and get your provider to review this and respond directly to you.
Try and resolve your complaint
We talk to you and your provider to try and resolve the complaint. We may also arrange a three-way conversation (by phone or video) with both you and your provider.
Complaint unresolved
We help you if your complaint is unresolved after...
Contact us if your complaint remains unresolved after 20 working days from when you first complained. We either:
Try and resolve your complaint
We talk to you and your provider to try and resolve the complaint. We may also arrange a three-way conversation (by phone or video) with both you and your provider.
See if we can start a formal investigation
If we think we can investigate, we will let the company know and they will then have a short time in which to respond.
Your provider may:
- make you an offer which you can either accept or decline
- ask you for more time to work with them to resolve your complaint, which you can either accept or decline
- say we shouldn't look into the complaint and set out a reason(s).
If we believe we can't investigate under our scheme rules, we will inform you, give you an opportunity to respond, and consider your input.
Formal investigation
We investigate your complaint
One of our dispute resolution experts either:
Investigates further
We seek all information relevant to your complaint.
Tries to resolve your complaint
We talk to you and your provider to try and resolve the complaint. We may also arrange a three-way conversation (by phone or video) with both you and your provider. We can also offer tikanga based dispute resolution to resolve the issue.
Commissioner's decision
We make a decision
If your complaint remains unresolved our Commissioner makes a preliminary decision, which you can respond to, and then makes a final decision. You can either: