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Complaints

08 Nov 2021

It is important we hear your feedback to help us fix a problem or learn how we can do things better. If you express dissatisfaction about our actions or decisions, we will record your comments as a complaint.

How to make a complaint

Call our Customer Service Team

Call 9240 1111 to talk to our Customer Service Team who will be able to talk through your complaint with you and make sure we get it to the right person to resolve it.

Our team is ready to take your call on weekdays from 8:30am to 5pm.

Accessible contact options

Accessible options for making a complaint include:

Child safe complaints

A child or young person, or an adult on their behalf, may want to make a complaint about a Council service, the way a Council staff member, or another adult, child or young person has treated them at a Council program, event, service, or facility or the way a problem was handled.

These complaints can be made to Council in the following ways:

  • Talk to a Council Worker at a Council program, service, event, or facility
  • Call 9240 1111 and ask to speak with a Child Safe Officer
  • Email ChildSafe@Merri-bek.vic.gov.au
  • Text/SMS to 0447 034 922

Report a child safe complaint

There is more information about managing child safe complaints, including information in العربية (Arabic), বাংলা (Bengali), नेपाली (Nepali), پښتو (Pashto), Türkçe (Turkish) and اردو (Urdu) available on our Reporting Child Abuse page.

If a child or young person is in immediate danger, call 000 (triple 0) and ask for the police.

The complaint process

We have a 3-tier complaint system for our complaint process that is explained below

Tier 1

Complaints about our standard services, such as the quality, delay, or failure to deliver a service are handled at tier 1 by the our officer level staff.

After the complaint is resolved you have the option of complaining about the way your complaint has been handled by asking for your complaint to be escalated to tier 2.

Tier 2

Complaints about policy decisions or officer conduct are handled at tier 2 by our Team Leaders and Managers.

After the complaint is resolved you have the option of complaining about the way your complaint has been handled by asking for your complaint to be escalated to tier 3 for an independent review.

Tier 3

Tier 3 covers independent internal reviews of how a complaint was handled at tiers 1 or 2, and are investigated by our Complaint Resolution Coordinator.

You can look at our Complain Procedure Flowchart (PDF) to find out more.

What to expect from our complaint process

When you lodge a complaint we will record the details and provide you with a reference number either by email or over the phone.

We aim to resolve all complaints within 28 days. Usually, we're able to resolve tier 1 complaints in about 5 days and tier 2 complaints in 14 days. Tier 3 reviews typically take 2 to 3 weeks to investigate.

If we aren't able to resolve your complaint within 28 days, we will contact you to let you know that we'll need extra time.

If your complaint is not resolved

After your complaint is closed, if you think there has been a mistake, you can make a complaint about the way your original complaint was handled. You can do this by calling 9240 1111. We will then escalate your complaint to the next highest tier to be considered.

You will be asked why you think a mistake has been made in handling your complaint. Not all complaints will be escalated. We may decide not to investigate or escalate a complaint depending on the nature of the complaint or reasons for escalation. We will not consider complaints again after they have received a tier 3 independent internal review.

You can read our Complaints Handling Policy (PDF) for more information.

Complaint performance data

Below are a series of charts which shows our recent performance data for receiving and handling complaints.

These charts were last updated on 23 March 2022. The data is accurate up to this date.