Barriers and enablers to trust in Australian public services

Trust in government services is indivisible from political trust

This research supports the existing literature and found that citizens’ trust in public services is linked to their perception of trust in government. Indeed, trust in Australian public services is indivisible from trust in politics. When asked whether they equate government services with the government of the day, one participant was quick to answer “Oh, 100%, Because that is what they are there for”. Participants identified that it is the government who directs the policies and hence the services available, their resourcing and ultimately their implementation:

“Absolutely, it starts at the top. Like if the guy who's supposedly leading our country has filled us with lies and bullshit and deceit, you can't really trust from there down the hill, can you?” [FG18]

“So when you ask about trust in public services, it’s hard not to say that it’s the politicians because they’re the decision makers at the end feeding it down. Eventually it does feed down, but as for the public servants delivering the services, I think that they can deliver it under the guideline and policies that they are delivering it, but they don’t get to make the calls.” [FG35]

“… I think our distrust of politicians … I think it feeds into our distrust of some services as well. Because that’s the end point of some of what they deliver. Like [Financial Support Service] is a government service and part of the issue with that poor running of the service is how much funding they receive.”[FG26]

Although one participant noted that in regional areas service implementation may be adjusted to do the right thing by the local community, despite the government of the day:

“They’re still going to try and do the right thing by you. Do you know what I mean? Because we’re in a regional area and there’s a sense of community. It’s not the city. It doesn’t depend so much on the Government of the day.” [FG8]

Linked to issues of integrity, some participants identified the lack of action, or follow through, of politicians as being critical in their trust of government and government services:

“If I’m looking at my trust rating, I can't trust a single word that comes out of their mouth because very rarely do we actually see them implement what they say they were going to do, simple. … Because it starts [with politicians]. It’s drip fed down and that concerns me that if they’re not even doing what they say, what’s actually going to happen to all of these services?” [FG12]

“I kind of trust them. … But I don’t totally trust them. … I just wish they’d get off their backside, and make policies, and do it. Instead of hoo-haaing.” [FG23]

This distrust of politicians is a significant barrier for developing and maintaining trust, with politicians seen as a significant inhibitor of good service delivery, with one participant wishing they would leave policy and service delivery to the experts, the public servants:

“The vast majority of the senior public servants in Canberra and elsewhere in the country that are subservient to Canberra, are attempting to do the right thing. Politicians now call the shots and to the extent that people in senior administrative positions are political appointments, and they never used to be until about 15 years ago. I would say, let the managers manage.” [FG29]

Every single experience matters for every single service

Given the importance of experience in determining trust, every single service delivery experience matters. Trust in government services is not limited to a single service, with a poor experience with one service potentially affecting a citizen’s trust in other government services due to the need for multi-department services, which can be difficult to overcome:

“I just said previous experience. Once your experience of the government service is bad, it’s going to probably take you seven times going back and receiving good service to actually change your opinion of that service originally.“ [FG6]

“Because some departments when you go to, you need more than one of them to fulfil that need and it's just hard to trust people when you get knocked from say two of them and there's five there and you think what's the use of going to the other three?” [FG14]

“I feel like it’s hard to give a good overall rating if you’ve had such incredibly horrible service from even just one government service it can really taint your view on all of them because you really just sort of think of it as one. …. So when you have had such horrible dealings, it can just taint your overall trust of the whole lot.” FG1

“Despite having poor experiences with [services], I’ve also had some good experiences with the exact same agencies so it seems to me that out of every 50 people you deal with, 25 of them are right at the mark, the other 25 couldn’t give a rat’s ass and that’s my experience so that’s why its 50/50.” [FG2]

A mix of delivery approaches is critical

Delivery approaches are important for citizens’ trust in and uptake of public services. A number of delivery approaches were discussed including online, face to face, phone and ‘seamless’ or invisible service delivery.

Higher trust ratings were given to seamless services: “I just gave high ratings to the ones where I don’t have to deal with anyone” [FG6], or those that were easily accessible and reliable. Those services which did not deliver in a timely manner, or at all, were given lower trust ratings, particularly when they did not follow through on promises:

“Just seamlessness, and invisibility. Like, the [Health Service Agency] you don’t go knocking on [Health Service Agency] door to get help. Whereas going to [Financial Service Agency] is an absolute nightmare. It takes you days, and weeks, and months, back and forth.” [FG7]

“We are going to give you this. We are going to help you with this, and we are going to help you with that, but you’ve got to fill out 40 forms that we are going to then send back and say you can’t have it anyway because you misspelt one word. Or you can fill out the 40 forms again.” [FG12]

Online

Online service provision was identified as an enabler of access to services, providing efficient service delivery with access as good regionally as in metro areas:

“The amount of services I have to interact with if I couldn’t do it online, I don’t know how I’d manage. I don’t have time. I’m either at work or I’ve got three kids; not going to be going to [Financial Support Service] and all these places all the time.” [FG35]

“But I don’t think I’m missing out because I’m living in a rural area. It’s quite good. … I do as much as I can digitally, here in [regional community], that I don’t think it’d be any different if I was in Sydney. I would still do it online if I could.” [FG7]

“Yeah, I like it, you can do it whenever you want, I’m a bit of a control freak so I do it myself and make sure it’s done properly as far as I can do it. You’re not relying on somebody else to fulfil their job correctly, you’re not relying on how good a day they’re having, or whether they’d be bothered, you haven’t got to wait for ages, you can get that information as it’s stated, not as somebody interprets it and then passes it on.” [FG29]

However, online service delivery relies on having reliable access to high quality internet, which is often not available in rural and regional communities making accessing services even harder. Without good internet access online services can be frustrating:

“It’s so incredibly frustrating, having to do anything online at the moment. I don’t know what everybody else’s experiences are but where I am, it’s a continual source of frustration and emotional energy drain.” [FG 8]

Such frustration was also aimed by many participants at the poor information available online which they feel is not designed for the users:

“… if you’re trying to do something online, even if you’ve got a super reliable connection, you can spend hours wandering around in a fog because there’s no transparency about – they’re not trying to make it easy for people.: [FG8]

“You need to have acquired the technology to do it, but you get on their websites, and I don’t know who designs their systems. But you’ve got to be psychic to be able to follow what they want. In order to get what you need, you’ve got to run through this maze, it’s complete bullshit.” [FG29]

While many participants identified they were comfortable with using online services, there was a considerable level of concern raised about the depersonalisation of services, and their suitability of online services for many parts of the Australian community, including those whom services are targeted for:

“There’s huge benefits to the digital age and having information all stored somewhere. There’s huge benefits to that. But it depersonalises everything. “Oh, I’ll just go look online for that. Don’t talk to me.” [FG16]

“I’m cautious about it. I like digital but it’s very hard for some members of the population. There’s a whole suite of people who really need services who can’t access them. There’s homeless people, there’s elder people, there’s a whole suite of those that I feel it completely neglects.” [FG15]

“I’ve used it but I think there’s probably benefits around it for some people and I think it’s probably more people struggle with it and don’t like it, especially the Aboriginal community, they don’t have internet, for that kind of thing. I think it’s taken away a lot of the face-to-face things too. People need to sit down and talk to families and people. It’s going away from that. It’s doing a lot of damage. It’s all about delivery again, it’s not friendly. No people skills. And these people are usually the ones who are struggling, they need services, support, even someone to listen to them talk. It’s a big thing to people.” [FG21]

Some participants were concerned about the potential impacts on those who cannot utilise digital services, including increasing exclusion from society and simply getting ‘left behind’:

“And you’re already putting elderly people and keeping them in a home, it all goes online and digital, they stop having that outside interaction. It’s another chip away of community. That’s where the isolation comes in, if they were doing it at home.” [FG15]

“One thing I do find and there's a lot of people don't have computers because they're elderly or they just don’t - can't afford it or any of that, so it makes -it's a have and have not sort of thing about this information online. Not everyone is online or capable of doing it or have the facilities to do it and they're pushing everyone. … But they are getting left behind by government because everything's online.” [FG18]

Online delivery platforms, such as myGov, were a popular innovation for many participants, providing an efficient and informative service, although others found it difficult and needed more support:

“I do like the myGov app, having everything available in one place. It’s so easy to navigate through there. Have all the information that you’ve provided there. Having all the letters that I would have lost if they were paper form. They’re all right there. So I think it’s an excellent system, personally.” [FG12]

“It's a pain in the neck. Well to start off you have to make sure your computer's doing the right thing or your phone's doing the right thing, and then you've got to sit down and dissect the words they're trying to explain to you what they want you to do. I just want someone to casually explain it to me in a language and a way that I understand. And I've got to get onto myGov and I tried one day and gave up and haven’t gone back to it, but the answer is that I need to get onto it and I just don't have the mental energy to deal with it, but I desperately need to do it and I'm thinking what am I going to do? Because nobody at [Financial Support Service] going to help me do anything.” [FG14]

Innovation in service delivery over recent years was seen positively by some participants, with many participants observing the efficiency of the service, no matter the time of day, although a small proportion of citizens were less favourable about current online systems:

“I can see changes within these organisations, the ease of using, being online for instance. To me, that’s a positive. I do not want to be on the phone with somebody. I want to upload my bill, I want to see the money go into my account, I want to be able to look at my records.” [FG15]

“I like it, yeah. They never close, if you want to go and use a [Financial Support Service] app it’s always there when the office closes so I can look up anything I want anytime of the day, just because it’s always there, whereas office is closed.” [FG15]

“Because every single service was honestly made by a completely different mob, because none of them have got any kind of cohesiveness in how they look, how they function. … And if it’s annoying for me, anyone in the older generation is going to find it a nightmare, because as soon as you’ve learnt one, you try to use another service, you’ve got to relearn the language. And then you have to do that two or three times, depending on how many services you want to use.” [FG31]

Direct contact approaches

Face to face and phone delivery approaches remain critical to effective service delivery as they enable citizens support for more complex concerns that cannot be addressed via online approaches, and engender more trust:

“I would trust a person face to face more generally because you can just get clarification on the spot. Sometimes they don’t have the answers that you need but I’m always going to feel a lot more confident having walked away from face to face interaction where I can ask them all the questions I had in the moment as opposed to online where I’m not always sure I’ve done the right thing and there is no way to get any sort of clarification so for me personally yeah face to face, absolutely.” [FG1]

“Dealing with them in person is so much better than over the phone or via email because you get that face value. Then that comes back to the trust. I’m going to trust someone a lot more face-to-face.” [FG5]

However, these services are not without limitations, with the wait times, inconsistent messaging, and lack of personable service delivery detracting from the service experience, and hence trust in service delivery:

“…if [phone service] was delivered in a timely manner I would be more than happy. I would trust it just as much as I’d trust someone [face to face].” [FG9]

“I guess you could say– personable. You could make the service more personable for me, that’s what would gain my trust a bit more…. to not feel like you’re just, oh yes, resident number 3,482” FG9]

“It just seems like, “Oh no, I’ve got to make a phone call. Oh, I think I’d rather go to jail, than make this phone call.” … It’s about the same length as a jail sentence.”[FG9]

“It’s just like a packed lunch and a water bag and you bring your camel just in case because it could be the rest of your life, it’s just – it’s awful.” [FG9]

In those communities facing significant community and economic development challenges (eg. drought, closure of industries), citizens are needing more timely access to services, and typically via face to face approaches to enable efficiencies and provide a more empathetic service:

“They’re giving very limited resources out, access to services – I guess we’ve got a lot of people coming in to where we work to access drought funding, and to have to tell them that we don’t look after that because we’re a state government agency, here’s the federal government agency’s contact details, “I don’t want that. I want somebody to talk to right here, right now in this office.” [FG6]

“Why can’t we have the government services bus that comes here once every two months and sits in [regional town] for a week and then you can have everybody go and do their accesses and what they can’t do online or whatever accesses, they’re still seeing somebody face to face.” [FG6]

For some participants, trust was driven by personal interactions, highlighting the need for face to face service delivery options, particularly for complex cases, vulnerable people and those uncertain with online platforms:

“Maybe I’m old fashioned but I don’t think there’s any substitute for sitting in front of a guy … Holding your book talking to him asking him questions. “Why can I do this, why can’t I do that? What can I pay, what can’t I pay?” I just don’t think there’s any substitute for that.” [FG34]

“Like you said, the trust, you have more trust sometimes when you’re face-to-face, having the word and looking at someone and having the conversation, you feel like you’re being heard more or understood more versus just inputting something into a website.” [FG15]

For one person, poor service quality has resulted in face-to-face becoming the last resort, only an option after other delivery methods had failed:

“I think from my experience, going into the office, like [Financial support service] office, is now like a last resort if you can’t get any actual answers over the phone. People can’t just hang up on you when they’re standing in front of you, so I feel like the [Financial Support Service] service is a last resort. Yeah. The experience is so poor that people would rather sit on the phone for an hour trying to deal with something, and then if that doesn’t succeed, then they go into the office but that’s how bad it can get. It’s a last resort.” [FG20]

However, access to face to face services is becoming more difficult, especially with the ongoing push to use online service delivery platforms:

“I’m quite happy to walk into somewhere and go face-to-face with somebody, but at the end of the day, those somebodies don’t exist anymore.” [FG17]

“I prefer being able to speak to somebody in person. I’m sick of getting told, “You know you can do this online.” If I wanted to do it online I would have done it, I wouldn’t have came in here.” [FG22]

Mobile services are an important form of face-to-face delivery in remote communities, but they are not capable of providing the full array of services needed in remote communities, and suffer from technical difficulties like the residents:

“I think I would strongly agree that we in [regional centre] think that there are problems in terms of accessing services, but it’s much worse if you’re outside of [regional centre] for example, much, much worse in terms of being able to access federal government services. … when I used to go round the communities and that, like [Financial Support Services] would come in twice a week, sometimes. Someone would drive in, set up their little office, and that would be it. Then they’d leave, and they’d come back in a couple of days, because they go round everywhere else. And it is quite hard, especially if the computer system goes down, they can’t do anything. And even health services, a lot of communities have good clinics, but they don’t have the mental health support as well, they need. And that’s all federal stuff.” [FG19]

Similarly, phone services offer some level of interaction, and online chat functions can help with service outcomes:

“The phone is similar to walking in and actually talking to the person and they can explain things to you and you can sort of get a two-way conversation going. Whereas you’re online, you only have to look at the screen.” [FG30]

“There’s also the fact that a lot of websites now have the option of a live chat which I’ve used quite often. … Mind you I don’t type very fast, but I can make them wait for me which they have to and I’ve resolved quite a few things doing that. It is another way of actually having some sort of human interaction and not just having to follow a form.” [FG30]

A range of delivery approaches is needed

Overwhelmingly, participants observed the need to provide public services using a variety of delivery approaches, and to stop forcing people to use digital options only:

“I think one of the problems is they give you this option called online and they don’t give you any other options, you’ve got to do it online. When people go to [Financial Support Service] to apply for [financial support] and they say, “No, you’ve got to do it online.” Now, those people they haven’t got a computer, they’re too old, don’t know how to use a computer and they’ve got to do it online.” [FG34]

“One is that computers try to fit you all into square little boxes. Quite often that doesn’t really work when you’re trying to get information. You need a much broader range of discussion than just filling in a box or ticking a box. ... that’s why I think computerised systems are fine to give you a bit of an intro into where you might be going, but sometimes you then need to actually talk to a person who knows about it to give you that fine flourish, to actually get you to the point you need to be.” [FG19]

“Well, I really like that I can use [online] at any time, that’s convenient to me. I like to be able to be informed about everything that I can, so having all the information available is good. But I would like to see a more human element as well, if you are struggling, there needs to be an option for you to be able to contact someone who will help you, because a lot of times if it’s available online, there’s no human component to it, so there doesn’t seem to be a lot of in between.” [FG28]

“No I was just going to say, if you could have like the array of services, like when you really need to speak to someone over the phone with more complex matters you really do need that agent to be able to speak to. But when you’ve got those really quick questions that could be resolved literally in 30 seconds if you could just ask someone, eg. through a live chat service, it’s great. So this is what I’m saying like you can reduce the call times for people that really need to speak to someone by offering an array of different service channels to get through.” [FG32]

Supply-side and demand side drivers of trust

As identified in Section 2 there are supply-side and demand-side drivers of trust which help understanding of the impact of the various trust attributes. Citizens’ experiences are directly linked to these drivers at every stage of every service delivery received. Demand-side drivers create trust perceptions and include citizens’ own experiences of service delivery, experiences of their networks (and media), and the local social, economic and political factors. Supply-side drivers include service culture, service complexity and communications about and within service provision.

Demand-side factors

Personal experience, and the experience of others, whether it be friends, family, or strangers, have a significant influence on trust ratings. While some participants were only willing to base trust on their personal experiences, others were also informed by the experience of others although not always proud of this:

“Well they were really, at the times that I needed them, they were really hot on what I wanted and they backed off when I wanted them to, and it was fantastic. I can’t fault them. That’s just my experience.” [FG12]

“Well for me, my own experience has been fairly positive, but the reason I didn’t give it higher is because you hear all these horror stories in the media.” [FG7]

“If you’ve had a problem previously with them, you’re less inclined to accept what they tell you next time and trust that it’s correct. … You go in with your back up a little bit and you’re very cautious.” [FG25]

“I’ve had no dealings with [Financial Support Service], but it’s still ranked my lowest just because of these terrible stories I hear. I’m pretty disappointed in myself that I’m being so easily influenced by other people’s stories while I’ve got no dealings with them.” [FG8]

One potential influencer is the media with many participants noting that their trust in government services has declined over recent years due to experiences shared by their networks and the media: “I don't know, probably declined hearing from other people's opinions and reading what you see online and on the news and other people's stories.” [FG14]. Although participants were not always influenced by media with one noting “Am I the only one that totally doesn’t trust any of the info we get? I don’t at all. I feel like the media is a manipulator.” [FG8].

Study participants were asked to re-evaluate their overall trust rating in Australian government service delivery at the end of the focus group. While many kept their rating the same, others increased or decreased their rating based on their reflections of what they had learnt from the group discussions:

“Just some of them were from people’s experiences, from the good experiences obviously and things that I don’t – services that I have never had to deal with.” [FG8]

“Because I’ve just lost all respect for most of the Departments from what I’ve heard from everybody.” [FG8]

For one participant, the rating was increased due to their perception of fairness in service delivery, after she found that metropolitan citizens have similar service delivery experiences:

“Just from hearing some of the stories and the fact that people in the big cities, in the cities, the other side of the mountains there, hearing that they have similar difficulties to us. But the big thing here is the tyranny of distance of course. But we’re still pretty much able to get exactly what they’ve got. And if they’re having trouble, if they have trouble in the cities, then it’s really a fault of government. It’s a fault of delivery or a problem with delivery.” [FG6]

While for another, the overall rating decreased due to the lack of congruence with their values and the perceived lack of loyalty of the government to the citizenry:

“Yeah, it comes down to I hate knowing that there's people that genuinely need help that can't get it.” [FG14]

Perceptions of service experience and with that trust in service delivery is also heavily influenced by service delivery outcomes, with some participants identifying that bad experiences may be overlooked as the serviced was ultimately delivered, and in some cases delivered above expectations (see Box 2):

“Because I trust that they will deliver it and I’ve had bad experience with the government but at the end of the day, they still deliver even if you have to scream and yell. So I can’t say, go down and say “No, because I’ve had a bad experience” because I still, I had to jump through hoops, but I still got what they delivered at the end of the day.” [FG26]

Others expressed their long-standing dismay at government performance, and the impact of highly publicised service delivery scandals, highlighting the difficulty in increasing trust in Australian public services:

“Only up to about two because I still think they need a really good kick in the butt to start looking after their own people. They’ll need to really take a step up and really step up to the plate because I think they really really really over the last probably 10 years have let us down.” [FG9]

“[I gave a zero out of 10], = I've got one word and that is Robo-debt. So that's to [Financial Services Agency]. [No I did not receive a Robo-debt], but the stories I hear, the stories I read on the net, it just absolutely sickens me, it really does …” [FG14]

Trust in service delivery is highly influenced by personal experiences, with participants expressing a frustration at the lack of professional and timely service provision which can have significant personal ramifications including the suspension of payments or in some circumstances the choice to not use those services at all:

“…there’s a different person [Finance Services Agency Office] there every four weeks because they all quit, it must be a terrible job – and he said, “I’ll ring you.” I said, “Okay.” So he didn’t ring me, the next thing, I get a text message, ‘Your payment has been suspended.’ Oh, you can’t ring them because the [regional town] office does [regional towns] and everywhere else, there’s no one ever in the office, so you’ve got to just keep ringing each day until someone actually answers the phone, “Oh, sorry, that’s our fault. We’ll fix that for you.” And then, two days later you’re suspended again. It's almost insane…” [FG6]

“I had the same experience when I was working in [location 2 hour drive away]. … [I] got a message one day saying that I had an appointment. I rang them up and told them [I was working], and they said this is whatever appointment, this is one you have to attend. And I’m like, what, so I’m supposed to jump in the car, miss tomorrow’s work, come back to [regional town] so I can report and say yes, everything’s good, yes, work’s good, yep, sweet, I just missed a day for you. … I ended up getting my payments cut off and I just stayed off [Finance Service] up until I finished doing that job up there. It was just easier for me not to mess around. Just work and do my thing.” [FG6]

Supply-side factors

A number of supply-side factors were raised as barriers to trust in service delivery, particularly issues associated with delays in receiving services, administrative processes and errors, service consistency, complexity and access and challenges of cross-departmental services.

Many participants commented on the lengthy delays of processing claims from a number of services, each with significant detrimental impacts on individuals and their families, with such experiences eroding trust in public service delivery as explained by one participant who had to wait over six months to receive financial support:

“I mean it’s a huge emotional rollercoaster to, one, wanting to kill my husband, to – feeling like I wanted to, not going to obviously – and the stress it’s put on our family, my kids, my daughter – I’m getting a bit emotional – my daughter has had to lend us money from working to get us through. And she’s 16, she shouldn’t have that responsibility. I mean they understand what we’re going through and obviously you’re going through that sort of stuff too, but you’re told you can access these things to make things easier and it doesn’t make it easier.” [FG10]

For others, the impact of continual delays in processing is overwhelming, as shared by one participant who was struggling with three children with special needs (see also Box 3):

“Exactly one year ago, I was in [regional centre] because I had [a lot of issues to deal with]. Due to the fact that 3 kids with special needs, has taken quite a toll on me. My husband being a transport operator is often gone for 3 months at a time, and getting knocked back from service after service because they just don’t want to help you, and you have kids [not getting on with each other] and attacking me and everything else and pretty much I’m not getting any help for me. I just couldn’t deal with it anymore [and I had to get help]. ….” [FG4]

Other participants expressed the frustrations of ongoing administrative processes and errors which had a substantial personal impact:

“Now I got cut off probably at least eight times during the year for not reporting who I’d gone to jobs for, when the lady there, who’s just lovely, told me not to bother coming in for the appointments because I was sending her all my payslips and she knew I was working, but if she didn’t put into the computer that I’d gone for jobs, it’d cut me off. And I kept getting these letters saying that I’m getting cut off something that I wasn’t getting paid anyway. It was distressing. I’m so glad it’s over. … [it made me feel] so embarrassed, upset, frustrated, just terrible. On the verge of tears sometimes because some of the people that you talk to on the telephone after you’ve been on there for 45, 50 minutes, talk to you as if it’s coming out of their pocket. It’s very embarrassing that you have to disclose so much personal information to just get frustrated and get nothing anyway.” [FG21]

“But the number of mistakes that were made, yeah, at various times and missed -yeah just wrong payments, wrong assessments, like yeah, even my interpersonal dealings with some of the staff at [Financial Support Service] was difficult. And I think to myself, well I’ve got a tertiary degree and I consider my interpersonal skills quite good, imagine how hard this is for some others in our community.” [FG26]

“… third time used to be the charm for putting in the forms because they use to lose them at least twice before they’d record them. You would have to provide them at least three times and when you lived away from the office that was difficult to get there and do those sorts of things.” [FG30]

Many focus group participants commented on the negative impacts associated with the complexity of service delivery. Impacts included loss of income and/or savings and for some negative wellbeing. For some, these impacts were exacerbated by the vulnerability they were facing due to unexpected life events (i.e. poor health, death in the family), highlighting the importance of efficient and effective service delivery (see Box 4).

A number of participants expressed how the complexity of service delivery eroded their trust in government, and that the government needed to provide services more easily to improve trust:

“This is where a lot of my distrust comes from for the Government, is because I actually think they make it incredibly hard so that less people do it.” [FG8]

“Maybe just provide what they say they’re going to provide. Instead of making it hard for people to get what they want, things that they need, not necessarily want, but the things that they need to survive should be just okay, read this, fill this out, do this, there’s your payment. It’s done and dusted. And these are the rules that go with it. This is what you have to do to keep this payment. Whether it goes on the age of your kids or whatever it is. I don’t think we do enough of that.” [FG12]

The complexity of information is compounded by the lack of linkage between government departments, duplicating compliance requirements and making access to eligible services harder, with participants often talking about the need for linked services to trigger alerts and with that help to reduce administration, noncompliance issues and/or prompt advice on other relevant services available:

“…each department doesn’t follow through with the next department. You deal with one person, that is the focus. They won’t read the notes, they won’t do this. You’ve got to supply huge amounts of stuff over and over and over again. … Yes, I’m very lucky and we were very lucky that we have the facilities and the access that we do. But they make it so damn hard to access some of them, so damn hard.” [FG10]

“It would be nice if all the services were linked and some things would trigger other, at least alerts in other systems…” [FG12]

“Yeah it seems as though the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing with all the different departments. And you would think that somewhere along the way, somebody would have put some sort of centralised computer system in place or something.” [FG32]

For others, the inflexible duplication of information provisions is demanding and stressful, eroding trust in government service delivery:

“I had to start the process from scratch again. Doesn’t matter that they’ve got everything that they require on file; you have to start from scratch and provide everything all over again. So I only did that once and I’m not doing it again after that, so I just kept on pushing forward, but it was hard work. It was stressful, it was dreadful.” [FG17]

For those going through significant adversity, this duplication of information provision and demands for more and more information has significant personal impact and affects perceptions of trust for many years as outlined in Box 5.

Transparency and the associated governance of decision-making was raised by some participants as being important and problematic, with too little recording of decisions which results in negative impacts on the citizen if the decision is changed:

“And you say, oh I've done the thing on your advice, well they're never going to put anything down in writing so they can screw you over, even by saying, we told you the wrong thing, bad luck, you're in trouble.” [FG18]

“I do like to have some kind of record. I have a feeling sometimes when you talk to somebody you just talk but it just stays there it doesn’t go unless they take notes and they take records of it, there is no evidence for me. With online things I’m actually trying to evade where there’s no record because I like to have records so I can say, “This is what happened, or we discussed.”” [FG22]

The complexity of service delivery is not only about the forms and processes, but also the quality of information provided and the information expectations of citizens, with some participants anxious about having to access services due to the information requirements, with one describing it as like ‘going to war’:

“[Don’t understand information] Because it's in jibber jabber. It's not plain English, that's right. And to these days, a lot of people do not know how to read properly.” [FG14]”

“I get anxiety just even contemplating it and then thinking how much time am I going to have to set aside and when I finally get to the front of the queue and I can speak to someone on the phone, am I even going to understand what they’re telling me? Like I prefer to have my partner with me and for him to be able to interact as well because sometimes you’re even getting the jargon on the phone or they’re demanding information of you that I didn’t know I was supposed to have and you feel like you’ve wasted everyone’s time and yeah the anxiety of it can just sometimes be totally [overwhelming], I won’t even do it.” FG1

“I always feel like ([Financial Support Service]) I always go in armed with too much information … I always make sure I’ve got too much with me just to make sure they don’t send me back home. So it’s like getting ready for war. it’s sad – it shouldn’t be that way. Like we should all be like just giving up.” FG1

The experienced difficulties in accessing services was frequently raised as an influence on trust perceptions:

“So they’re like, we have all of these options for you but your ability to access them is made quite difficult so that’s just really quite frustrating and makes it quite hard for those who struggle to jump through the hoops and run through the maze to just get to a service that’s there for them and in terms of delivery” [FG1]

Access issues include challenges with timely service provision at service shopfronts or on the phone, capacity of citizens to use services due to literacy challenges and/or poor information provision, adequate access to internet or transport infrastructure.

A common barrier to trust was perceived inadequate service provisions, with long wait times and poor-quality services resulting in low trust ratings:

“But then like I went into [Financial Support Service] in March this year, and you’re like there’s only about five people in there, and there’s 100 people waiting to see five people. Like I remember when I was 18 and that, you’d go into [Financial Support Service], there’d be people, and they’d talk to you, and you’d get through it. Now it’s like if you don’t do your online form, they don’t want to talk to you. … But yeah, information’s not there like it used to be, I believe.” [FG19]

“I don’t know if it’s all mixed together but it’s like when you’re on one line to someone and they don’t know what they’re talking about, then they put you onto another line of somebody else, and then they put you on to somebody else and “Oh we don’t know what’s going, we’ll put you back to this one”. It’s happened to me like six times in one day and in the end I cracked the shits. And I said “I’ve been on this phone for four hours and you can’t do this for me” and in the end they sort it.” [FG26]

“… time is money for every individual, not just the Government.” [FG8]

Although several participants shared their positive experiences with Australian government public service delivery as well:

“You know, I’m listening to all this, and you must be doing something wrong. … Because I go to [Financial Support Service], I’ll walk in there, I get help immediately. I’m on the phone – I’m on the phone maybe 10 minutes to [Financial Support Service] and I’m answered. I go to the doctor without an appointment, I’m in.” [FG33]

“Everybody’s saying how bad [Financial Support Service] is. I’ve never had that problem. Every time I’ve put in for a claim or gone in there or done it online even, I can do it the day that it’s due and it’s done.” [FG5]

Some participants noted that, although services were often hard to access, once you were in the system it was reliable and hence they had high trust in the service delivery, although others felt that the difficulty to access services was unduly affecting those who were already stressed and therefore had a low level of trust on government service delivery:

“I know there’s a lot of hoops you have to jump through, but generally once you get there, you get what you’re entitled to. So I’ve had that safety net thing where I was on my own and I was only working one day a week, so I did get that support. It did take a while to get through it, but I got the support in the end. And so yeah, I’ve had really good experiences. So far I just think in some ways, things could be done better.” [FG12]

“We’ve got a system that isn’t helping people that need to be helped by [Financial service agency] and people are screaming out and the government’s ignoring that. … The [Health Service] is another thing that has been created but like [participant] said, you’ve got to get through all the hoops first before it’s even going to be beneficial and that takes a lot of time and sometimes if people don’t have time, they’re lives are already stressful enough as it is.” [FG12]

The capacity of citizens to effectively access services was raised as a concern in remote communities. Poor awareness of service availability, low levels of literacy, coupled with complexity of service delivery, diminished the capacity of vulnerable citizens to access services, despite their need and eligibility:

“… my thinking was that for the services where people know how to use the services, they can be really good if you can get through the paperwork and all the bureaucracy, but the majority of my [remote and vulnerable] clientele would not have a clue as to what these services are, what they do, how to fill out a piece of paper … looking at [Community] as a whole, I would say that the majority of people in [Community] wouldn’t even know half these agencies, or what they do.” [FG17]

Perceived complexity of services is heightened by the poor local service quality, poor local provision of information and lengthy forms (see also Box 6):

“There are times where I use the digital because I know that the people delivering the services don’t have the knowledge of where I need to go to, but then I have a problem because I get onto the site and then I can’t find what I need, so then that becomes extremely difficult again. … And then you finally find what you need and it starts spitting out 20 sheets of paper.” {FG17]

Some participants felt that the level of complexity was a deliberate ploy to reduce service uptake:

“Generally I think, they don’t want to hand out any money, so they’re going to put a whole bunch of barriers to get in the way of doing that so you have to climb six different walls to get their little hand out.” [FG31]

Participants from a number of communities identified the lack of personnel in government offices as an impediment to service delivery due to the association delays in receiving a service:

“There can be four or five of them in there all sitting at their desks, but only one person is seeing people. And then she’ll pack up and go to lunch and you all sit there for an hour until she comes back. I’ve been in there for three hours plus.” [FG6]

Similarly, the lack of consistency in the quality of service provision associated with perceived poor training of frontline staff was identified as eroding trust, although at other times they received a high-quality service:

“Sometimes you can get lost, you are after something, and you get passed around like a football. … And you wait on the phone forever and ever. … Then you get onto someone who doesn’t really understand what you’re talking about. It’s frustrating. … [But] in fairness, other times I’ve rung up and I’ve got a beauty. Really helpful the whole way through. It’s just the consistency I guess.” [FG7]

“As I said, you deal with one person, but they don’t read the notes, or they don’t – each person you deal with says something different. It’s not a uniform of information. It’s like people are on the phone and they just tell you what they feel to tell you at that particular time, even if it’s incorrect. And that’s really confusing and that undermines the trust and all that in the government’s services and things.” [FG10]

“Because sometimes you do have a good experience. Sometimes you have a person that actually goes that extra mile and you feel like they’re connecting and know what you’re going through and you might sometimes go to the place, you feel like you could kiss them … you just finally get the one person that you can just kiss them because they’re actually human. They listen to you as a person not just as another number …” [FG4]

The treatment of clients from service delivery staff was also identified by some service users as being detrimental, where citizens felt as though they, and others, were looked down on by service delivery staff:

“…when I had a few issues with jobs not being secure, I actually deliberately did not go for [Financial Support Service] payments because I felt like I was being treated like a second-rate citizen if I wanted their assistance. Even though I was working casually, they made me sit in a room to work out how to conduct myself at a job interview, and I was made out to be an absolute idiot.” [FG8]

“It's like you're a piece of dirt. They make you feel that they don't like you going there, to get the service.” [FG14]

“Half the time they don’t really want to help you. They just want to get in and get out. … [This makes me feel] tired and drained and depressed and a lot of the time you do feel like giving up and you never get an answer or you get shoved around or yeah, just -it does, it depresses people and honestly I wonder a lot of younger people are actually going, stuff this. I can’t deal with this anymore. Because it is, it’s depressing.” [FG30]

One participant noted the importance of the service delivery for people’s lives, and hence the need for frontline staff to recognise they work in community services and do their best at all times:

“It’s still your personal decision and your deliberate reaction to a situation, you are in control of what you do, if you choose to be a dick and not nice to people well … Do your job then that’s what’s given. Not doing the best you could do, if you are in the community service you need to be prepared to serve the community. Whether they’re nice, whether they’re not, whether your boss is there for you, whether they’re not, you need to find mechanisms in everything to be able to do your job properly otherwise you’re letting other people down and it can mean someone doesn’t get paid, someone’s kids get taken off them, someone doesn’t end up going to hospital and dies. It’s serious.” [FG29]

Although other participants acknowledged that this treatment may be due to the pressures of the job and the ongoing reduction of resources:

“A lot of it’s the way you’re treated and spoken to, especially back at [Financial Support Service] again. But that’s – probably can’t blame them. If I worked there, I’d probably talk like that too. And that comes back to probably not so much the customer but the amount of clients they’ve got to deal with every day.” [FG6]

“I've dealt with them in the past which they eventually got what I wanted, but it just took so long. And I understand that their work load's doubled, their resources have been cut and the staffing has been cut, they haven't got enough staff for the amount of people that they deal with, so that's basically why.” [FG14]

“Yeah. I do trust them to deliver services. But on the same token I feel like cost cutting measures, and saving a dollar, sometimes results in poor service delivery.” [FG23]

While some of participants were concerned with the attitude of frontline staff which reduced their levels of trust, others acknowledged the work that such staff were doing given the parameters they have to work under and were more positive in their trust ratings:

“Attitude, I want them to change their attitude because when I walk in the office or call them, they think I owe them something. I want them to think that they owe me something. I pay their wages. It’s all been phrased, going around, stereo typical but it has become true, I mean, I pay your wages, you do the service for me.” [FG2]

“Regardless of what the government view over here of the government today, I do believe regardless of who they are they’ll try and do the right thing by you. They’re held in by the rules that are set on them. Yeah, within reason they do try, most of them do – because they’re like you and me, they try to go and do their job as well as they possibly can, but they’ve got people further up the tree that don’t want them to go and do it.” [FG27]

Some participants took this acknowledgement of the efforts of frontline delivery staff further, and identified that the problem with low quality service delivery lays with the managers and the Ministers:

“… it's not the individual people that work the phones that are the issue, it's probably more the management and the bureaucrats that set the rules as to what they can and cannot do. So my seven out of 10 is based on that if you looked at all the staff in the Public Service, I think that just about all of them are good but maybe you've got the few powerful bosses that kind of make it hard for everybody else. So the minus three from 10 is management and Ministers.” [FG14]

“They're doing as much as what they can with what they are given [the resources]. It's the ones higher up who makes it harder for them. They try and bend over backwards for you but then they can only go so far.” [FG14]

“I think for me it is we need to have trust in the policy and the providers above the coalface because once those rules are written, it doesn’t matter how well it happens down further, already the discrimination or the unfair nature of it is already written. So once that policy and the providers get put in place, there’s not much anyone else can do underneath.” [FG25]

A small number of participants outlined poor service culture experiences which had significant impact on their families (see Box 7). Much of this was due to a lack of empathy expressed by service delivery staff with comments such as “Well, she’s in hospital. She doesn’t need it anyway.” [FG20] following requests for support.