Acknowledgment letters have helped reduce the number of people calling the Office of the Public Guardian for an application update – but callers are still waiting at least 20 minutes for someone to pick up the phone, the government has revealed.

Responding to a written parliamentary question from Labour’s Beth Winter about average call wait times, justice minister Damian Hinds said the average call wait time to the OPG between 20 and 24 March was 22 minutes and 18 seconds.

Hinds said additional staff have been recruited, trained and expected to start taking calls this month.

In another response, justice minister Mike Freer said acknowledgment letters were introduced last September to reassure customers about the progress of their applications and reduce the number of calls.

OPG also identified the top 15 questions people call about. Since last June a frequently asked questions section is played on call lines while customers are waiting for someone to pick up the phone.

Anonymous woman on a phone call

The average call wait time between 20 and 24 March was 22 minutes and 18 seconds

Source: iStock

Freer said the Powers of Attorney Bill, a private member's bill backed by the government, will reduce call volumes and wait times further.

The government also expects the OPG to return to its eight-week target for registering lasting powers of attorney before the end of the 2023-24 financial year.

According to government figures, the average time to register and dispatch an LPA application reached its highest level in October, at just over 20 weeks (102.22 working days), which has since fallen to just under 18 weeks (89 working days).

The government’s data shows that in February only 199 LPA applications were dispatched within 10 weeks – 62,500 applications took 10-20 weeks and 4,942 applications took more than 20 weeks.

Freer said: ‘The OPG is recovering from a backlog which was created during the pandemic and is facing high demand to process LPA applications. Customers are currently advised to allow up to 20 weeks for LPA applications to be processed. This includes the statutory four-week waiting period and any queries that may need to be resolved. OPG’s target to register LPAs is within an average of eight weeks. To work towards that target, OPG staff are working shift patterns to register LPAs, extra staff have been hired, and process efficiencies have been implemented.’

 

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