Which Government agency takes the longest to pick up the phone?

December 2, 2022

Consumer NZ has launched an investigation to figure out which Government call centre takes the longest to answer calls from customers.

A Consumer NZ investigation has found Immigration NZ is frustratingly hard to contact by phone, with some callers being stuck on hold for two and a half hours.

The investigation came after Consumer NZ research looking into business phoneline wait times - this newest one is a snapshot to see who is better at picking up the phone.

Consumer contacted 16 government agencies, calling on workdays between 9am and 5pm. It found that Government agencies’ wait times were twice as long as businesses.

“What we found was [businesses] performed a lot better - their wait time was about half of what the government agencies were,” Consumer NZ’s Gemma Rasmussen told Breakfast.

“We had a sneaking suspicion that the Government had some really long wait times.”

The investigation found that the worst offender was Immigration NZ, with the Human Rights Commission as well as Work and Income proving difficult. However, Rasmussen told Breakfast that Immigration NZ is definitely the worst.

“Not only did we have four attempts to contact them and various hangups, but we were on hold for two and a half hours which was really frustrating.

“There was one instance where we were on hold for an hour and a half, and then the call inexplicably hung up,” she said.

Elderly woman on smart phone.

While Immigration seems to be a purgatory of hold music and automated messages, some agencies performed very well.

Rasmussen said that CERT, Customs NZ and the IRD picked up the phone very quickly, all answering calls in under two minutes.

She said that while there is nothing callers can do to make long wait times more bearable - the agencies themselves could take a number of measures to make life a little easier.

She said communicating how long the wait will be to callers is the best way to handle the situation. One suggestion was to clearly list that the phone might be busy on the agency website, and another to offer return calls.

“With immigration New Zealand, we would understand that they have a very high call volume - some of these government agencies are under a lot of pressure, so we do completely recognise it.

“It is difficult on their end, but we would love to see more proactivity around the communication surrounding wait times when they can; it won’t cost them any money,” Rasmussen said.

Immigration NZ has been contacted for comment.

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