Making a Complaint

Step 1: Contact your financial service provider

Internal Dispute Resolution (IDR)

All financial service providers that are Members of COSL are required to have an Internal Dispute Resolution (IDR) procedure for handling customer complaints. It is also a condition of ASIC’s Regulatory Guide 165 that a licensed financial service provider (eg an ACL or AFSL) have a documented IDR process and must within 45 days (or 21 days if an application for financial hardship or where a default notice is issued) provide a final response to a complaint from the time it is first made, whether orally (by phone or in person) or in writing.

• We encourage you to contact the person you dealt with or the financial service providers customer complaints area first to discuss the issue and see if it can be resolved quickly by them.
• A set of sample complaint letters are available on the consumer website of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). There are sample letters for complaints about most types of financial services or product related complaints such as credit, financial advice, savings accounts and insurance.
• Before we can consider your complaint, the financial service provider must have been given an opportunity to resolve the complaint with you directly first. In most cases, the financial services provider has up to 45 days to respond to your complaint.

Search COSL Members for the complaint contact details and person of your financial service provider

Step 2: Lodging your complaint with us

External Dispute Resolution (EDR)

If the complaint remains unresolved after you have recieved a response from your financial services provider, or if the financial service provider does not repsond within the required time, you can lodge the complaint with us.

If the financial service provider has not yet had an opportunity to resolve the complaint with you directly, we will refer it to them before we can consider it further. As part of our registration process, we will contact the financial service provider and ask it to respond to you directly.

• Read our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). These answer some common questions asked and will help you understand the complaint process.
• Review the Complaints Covered and Rules to see what we can consider.
• Contact us if you have any further questions on 1800 138 422.

What happens next?

Once we receive your complaint, we will confirm receipt by phone, email, letter or fax within 3 working days and inform you of the Case Manager who has been assigned to your case.