Centrelink`s service continues to be a headache, with complaints rising nearly 40 percent last year, a new report found.
The annual report of the Federal goverment Commissioner says Centrelink`s telephone and online services continue to be complaint slots.
In fiscal year 2015-16, the number of complaints rose 38% from the previous year`s 8700.
The main complaints are about the lack of access to the phone and the challenges of contacting Centrelink to explain their actions or review their decisions.
Earlier this year, goverment promised to improve customer service standards, but customers still complained about long waiting times.
The National Audit Office`s 2015 report found that 1/4 of the calls to Centrelink were unanswered, while the average waiting time rose to 17 minutes.
But in January ABC found that some users had to wait as long as 75 minutes to talk to people.
However, the Department of Social Services said that they had improved the quality of the phone, and the average waiting time for the telephone on social security and welfare services fell to 15 minutes.
The commissioner noted that Centrelink had a service to call back customers, which was cancelled in July.
In the last fiscal year, Centrelink handled about 56 million calls.
