Mr. Liam Sloyan:

In 2022, 28% of our complaints related to customer service. Things like response times and the ability to contact the provider would all be included within that. We did mention that some of these complaints fell to be resolved quite quickly once they came to our office. That is one thing that I noted in the overview of complaints. There is an opportunity there for providers to look at these types of complaints and ask if the customers really needed to come to us. The case of "Angela" was highlighted in the overview. She paid off her mortgage and wished to be discharged from it so that she could get full title to her house. According to Angela, she tried to contact the financial service provider for a year, and was unable to do so. She then came to our office, and once our office came into the picture, the matter was resolved quickly. Those types of things are things that the providers can look at, to determine if they are issues that really require an ombudsman to get involved, or if they can look at their own systems to ensure that they can be addressed more quickly.