Dead parrots. It's an experience I'm sure many of us can relate to. One poll has voted the dead parrot sketch as the top alternative comedy sketch. I think one of the reasons it's so funny, like all great comedy, is that it takes an everyday experience and develops it until it reaches the absurd. The sketch was inspired by Michael Palin's real-life encounter with a car salesman.

Trying to make a complaint can sometimes make you feel like you're starring in your own dead parrot sketch. Or are your complaint experiences more Kafkaesque, where a simple complaint becomes a fight against what appears to be a complex, infuriating, and senseless bureaucracy? The Castle by Franz Kafka portrays the seemingly endless frustrations of a man's attempts to stand against the system, and the futile and hopeless pursuit of an unobtainable goal. But the reader is also confronted with a deeper truth, the basic human need for recognition and respect - two topics that are important, but often forgotten, for people who complain.

It's pretty clear that any business providing a service – public or private – can't deliver a high-quality service without a decent system for handling complaints. This year, we're looking more closely at service delivery in the public sector, so examining agencies' complaints set-up makes a lot of sense. (The other side is looking at case management – more on that later!)

Some organisations believe that customer complaints are a bad thing. And that logic leads them to believe that no complaints equals no problems. But if your organisation delivers services to people, it's unrealistic to expect that you will deliver perfectly to all your customers every time. So, although it seems quite clichéd, a complaint is really a gift – an opportunity for the organisation to do something better.

When businesses manage complaints well, this is (in a nutshell) what they do:

• Make it clear and easy for people to complain.
• Record those complaints properly.
• Respond properly.
• Improve their service based on what they learn from the complaints.

There's a stack of information around already on what "properly" looks like, including an international standard on complaints and the work of the Office of the Ombudsman on effective complaint handling. When this process works well it becomes a virtuous circle of complaints leading to service improvements, a “feedback loop”, hopefully reducing future complaints.

For our work to be useful, we picked agencies that deal directly with a lot of people – so we're taking a detailed look at what the Accident Compensation Corporation and the Ministry of Social Development do with complaints.

It's vital that we find out what the agencies' complaints systems feel like for people who are on the receiving end of them – an individual's experience of the complaints system can provide us with useful information on the effectiveness of the complaints system as a whole. So we'll be talking to some of the people who've made complaints. However, we can't be Erin Brockovich and advocate for individual members of the public. We'll be really clear about that, and hope that people will still want to talk to us.

We'll be starting our fieldwork in February, and it's going to be busy – here's just some of what we've got planned for both ACC and MSD:

• talking to service users to ask them what they think about making a complaint
• talking to people from throughout the agencies and asking them heaps of questions;
• poring over documents to understand how it all works in theory – and comparing that with what people told us about what they do in practice;
• looking at the letters or other communications they send people and assessing how easy those messages are to read and understand.

Essentially, we're going to be looking for evidence that the "feedback loop" is intact – that people can easily make complaints, which the agencies properly record and respond to, and use to improve their service.

It's probably easy for a private business to understand the importance of handling complaints as well as learning from them because the profit motive drives them. Good customer service is simply good business. Is it harder for a public entity that's in most cases a monopoly provider or delivering services without the profit motive attached to them? Do complaints still form part of that essential "loop", or are they simply responded to and counted for the graphs in the annual report, if they're reported at all?

Keep an eye out for the next post for more of our thoughts about complaints.

Between them, ACC and MSD are responsible for billions of dollars a year of public spending. ACC has 1.7 million new claims each year, and MSD administers payments to more than 300,000 people who receive the three main welfare benefit types.

Both ACC and MSD touch the lives of people living and working in New Zealand in a much more direct way than many other government agencies. If they’re good at what they do, everyone benefits – individuals, their families, and our society as a whole.

The chances of anyone needing to make an ACC claim are far higher than winning the lottery. It really could be you! And this is the part of my tale where the one-armed auditor appears. I was due to be leading the work on ACC’s case management, and was out and about in Wellington doing some fact-finding work.

When I migrated from the UK to live in Wellington, people warned me about a few things. Top of the list was always the infamous wind and its contribution to unpredictably bouffant hairstyles and many a mangled umbrella.

What nobody thought to warn me about was the high kerb heights on some Wellington streets. OK, so I’m no James Mortimer, but for someone of my height, scaling the kerbs represents a major sporting achievement. On a bright and clear day, I failed to clear the last hurdle – I went head over heels on Bowen Street.

I assume the kerbs are an engineering solution demanded by Wellington’s hilly landscape and rainfall (or perhaps to stop cars bumping up kerbs to park). My alternative theory is that there are hidden cameras everywhere, ready to record people falling over. These videos are then posted on YouTube in an attempt to depose cats from the number one spot on the net.

"The kerb got me" makes for an interesting story. Based on the numbers attending the Accident and Medical clinic in Kenepuru that day, I wasn’t the only one with that particular tale to tell.

Two hospital visits, X-rays, and an ultrasound confirmed a broken shoulder and ligament damage. The folks who get excited about trussing turkeys at Christmas marvelled over my sling, which skilfully pinned down my arm so the break could heal. This was when I stepped into the realm of being "case managed" by ACC.

And that was that – we had to find someone else to do the work on the ACC audit. Our office policy is that we need to be absolutely independent in the work we do, and as an ACC claimant I no longer fulfilled that vital brief. With a bit of shuffling around of project work, we managed to find someone to take my place – nothing more than a minor inconvenience.

The people whose ACC case management is reviewed by my colleagues will have had injuries far more disastrous and life-changing than mine. The Office is interested in their stories, and the role that ACC is playing in helping them and their whānau get the support that they need. My colleagues have spoken to individuals and advocacy groups to hear about their experiences. We won’t be intervening in the decisions made by ACC (or MSD) – that's a step beyond our role and powers. But we will report to Parliament on the findings later this year, and that report will be informed by real-life examples. If we think there are opportunities for improvement, we will make recommendations, which Parliament can then follow up with MSD and ACC.

For now, I’m going to see if I can find myself on YouTube…

As part of its eHealth work programme, the Ministry of Health is looking at emerging technology, such as patient portals, to help people use health services more easily. Patient portals are secure websites that allow people to access their health information and interact with their doctor. Through patient portals, people can send secure messages to their doctor, order repeat prescriptions, and, in some patient portals, view lab results and doctors’ notes. Without the use of technology like this, general practices are at risk of being left behind.

Patient portals increase the options people have for consulting their GP by enabling them to do this online instead of through a traditional face-to-face consultation. This can be more convenient and efficient for them and their GP. Changing to meet modern requirements has the effect of ensuring that general practices remain relevant and sustainable.

Private companies develop and run patient portals, and primary health organisations (PHOs) and general practices buy access to them. To encourage uptake among practices and the public, the Ministry has been working with other organisations to support their implementation and we’ve published a report that looks at how well it’s done this. (Collaboration is something our Office encourages – check out this recent blog post about how local authorities are working with others to address water management challenges.)

Working effectively with the health sector helped the Ministry to identify and address reasons why some general practices were reluctant to implement patient portals. For example, concerns about the cost to implement patient portals or safety and privacy. Some of the Ministry’s initiatives to address doctors’ concerns included:

• providing some funding and financial advice;
• preparing guidelines to support PHOs and general practices;
• appointing eHealth ambassadors to raise awareness and interest among doctors and provide guidance and support to them; and
• running awareness campaigns for general practices and the general public.

This work has helped the number of general practices offering patient portals to people more than double since June 2015.

The number of people signing up for a patient portal at their general practice has also more than doubled since June 2016. There were 233,839 registrations between June 2016 and June this year, taking the total patient portal users to 407,049.

This increased uptake in the use of patient portals is an encouraging sign that people do want to change how they interact with their doctors and access their health information. Since starting our performance audit about patient portals, I’ve joined up. I really appreciate the convenience of ordering my repeat prescription and seeing my tests results online and being able to discuss matters with my doctor in a secure environment before deciding whether I need an appointment.

Through our work, we’re seeing many examples of how public organisations in both local and central government are using technology to deliver services to New Zealanders. We’ll be publishing some reports on this topic in the coming months, so keep an eye out for them.

What are some of the services that you access and use online? We’d like to hear about your experiences in the comments section below.

In the afternoon, I would get the savings book back with the deposit amount and account balance handwritten in.

A lot has changed since then. I can now do all my banking without ever visiting a bank branch by using online banking or an app on my cellphone. I can check my balance whenever I want, which also means my wife can see what I’ve put on the credit card as soon as I’ve used it! Technology is changing the way that services are being delivered, and with that comes a change in peoples’ expectations.

Organisations in both central and local government are trying to make it easier for people to access and use their services by making them more customer-centred. For example, there are two Better Public Services targets focused on improving peoples’ interaction with government. In most cases, this involves allowing people to access and use services online.

We’ve previously published some reports about how some public entities improved their services by putting them online, including Immigration New Zealand: Delivering transformational change, Inland Revenue Department: Governance of the Business Transformation programme, and Ministry of Health: Supporting the implementation of patient portals (my colleague Joy has written a blog post about this last report). These reports include some handy information for organisations to consider when planning to invest in information and technology systems to improve how they deliver services. We are also doing some further work on this topic.

Auckland Council is going through a similar transition to make it easier for customers to access and use its services online. The Council is doing this through something called the ‘Customer-centric Transformation Programme’ (now called the Digital and Transformation programme).

As part of our regular reviews of the Council’s service performance, we've published a report titled Auckland Council: Working to provide customer-centred services online. This report looks at the Council's programme and two projects under it: Identity Management, and the Licensing and Compliance Services Smart Forms project. The purpose of the Identity Management project was to make it possible for customers to sign in to all Council services using a single login account. Historically, each service was set up differently so customers had different accounts to carry out different tasks.

The aim of the Smart Forms project was to put 21 of the Council’s Licensing and Compliance Services forms and payments options online, including dog, alcohol, food, and street trading licenses, and health and hygiene certificates. The project also aimed to make the Council’s forms easier to understand and use.

We found that how the Council managed the projects was consistent with the some of the elements of good practice we identified in our report Realising benefits from six public sector technology projects. One of the things that I found interesting about the programme was its use of a co-design methodology. This meant that customers and Council staff were both involved in the design process for each service. For me, the difference is instead of using customers and Council staff to just identify problems, the Council also involved these two groups in creating solutions. The benefit of this approach is that the final service or product is more likely to meet the needs of users and be more user-friendly.

With the projects now delivered, customers can use a single login to access all of the Council’s online services. The process for services has also been simplified – making registering a dog or applying for a licence to run a business quicker and easier. A good example is dog registrations and renewals, of which the Council receives more than 80,000 each year. Before the programme, to register your furry best friend you would have to either visit one of Auckland Council’s service centres or mail in your registration form. Now, these can be completed and paid online.

This is just the start for Auckland Council. It has a whole series of projects that it is planning to complete over the next two years to make its services more customer-friendly for Aucklanders.

Do you have any examples where public entities have made it easier for you to use and access services? We’d like to hear about your experiences in the comments section below.

We also encourage you to provide feedback to your council or other public entities about any problems you have in using and accessing their services. Without your feedback, they might not know that people find it difficult to use and access their services.