The conciliation resolution rate is one measure of the effectiveness of conciliation to resolve complaints.

What does it show?

The conciliation resolution rate shows how many complaints resolved as a result of a conciliation conference. A high conciliation resolution rate shows a financial firm is able to resolve disputes that reach this stage without a formal decision by AFCA.

A low conciliation resolution rate shows that a conciliation is not currently an effective way to resolve complaints against a particular firm and there may be opportunities to introduce best practice and improve how they engage with conciliations.

How the conciliation resolution rate is calculated

The conciliation resolution rate is calculated using the following formula:

• Complaints the AFCA case manager has marked as closed due to conciliation, as a percentage of total conciliations conducted during the reporting period.

Please note that data about conciliation conferences conducted by phone can take up to a month to appear on the dashboard.

Best practice

During a conciliation conference, an AFCA conciliator acts as a facilitator between a financial firm and a complainant, guiding discussions to find a fair agreement.

Here are some steps financial firms can take to prepare for and during a conciliation conference.

Before the conciliation conference:

• Consider the complaint from your point of view. Come with an understanding of the key issues of the complaint, and your/the firm’s response to the dispute.
• Consider the complaint from the complainant’s point of view. This will help you understand their unique circumstances, and how they might approach the conciliation.
• Consider the complaint from AFCA’s point of view. This will help understand what will happen if the complaint does not resolve on the day.
• Have relevant correspondence and documents on hand to refer to and share with AFCA and the complainant.
• Make sure you have the authority to resolve the complaint on the day. If that is not possible, make sure to have a contact available in your firm who can authorise resolution on the day.
• If you have not done so, read the attending a conciliation conference fact sheet, or watching the conciliation webcast on our website.

During the conciliation conference:

• We will ask the complainant to summarise their complaint first. We will then ask you to outline your firm’s response in a clear way.
• We will sometimes ask questions that we already know the answer to. We do this to get the parties talking about what needs to be discussed when the time is right.
• Approach the conference call in good faith and with an open mind to what the issues are and what a potential resolution could look like.
• Try to be clear and concise, and avoid industry jargon.
• If required, take notes during the conciliation.
• Remember, you can’t prepare for everything. New information is presented all the time, existing information does not get exchanged, and questions will be asked that you were not prepared for. If you don’t know the answer to a question, let everyone know you will find out and get back to them.
• If you get lost and do not know what to do, let us know so we can help.

After the conciliation conference:

• Close the loop on any matters which you were unable to resolve at the conciliation and take any action which you needed to do to finalise the conciliation.
• Consider reaching out to the complainant to acknowledge the discussion.
• Please give us feedback. You will be sent a feedback form automatically about one week after the conciliation. Please take the opportunity to let us know how it went then, or in your individual session with the conciliator if you feel the timing is right.

The AFCA process after conciliation