Australian Financial Complaints Authority - Turning the intranet into a single source of truth
The Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA) is a free, fair and independent service that helps consumers and small businesses resolve complaints about financial products and services, including banking, insurance, superannuation and credit.
Behind every complaint is a case manager working to reach a fair outcome. Their role is to carefully assess each situation, apply the relevant rules, and make decisions people can trust.
To do this well, they need access to accurate and up-to-date information.
Financial services is a fast-changing environment. Laws, regulations and industry practices evolve, and decisions must reflect the most current position. If outdated information is used, even unintentionally, it can affect the consistency and fairness of outcomes.
To reduce this risk, AFCA has focused on creating a single, reliable source of information for its people.
Rather than relying on saved or outdated documents, case managers access guidance through AFCA’s digital workplace, built on a SharePoint intranet.
AFCA’s Knowledge Centre is designed to ensure employees can easily find current, correct information. Strong governance, structured content design and ongoing insights from SWOOP Analytics support this system.
This disciplined approach has been recognised globally. In 2026, AFCA ranked fourth in SWOOP Analytics’ global intranet benchmarking, placing it among the healthiest intranets worldwide.
For case managers, the Knowledge Centre is not just a place to find information, it is central to how they do their work. It supports them to interpret guidance, apply fairness and progress complex complaints with confidence.
A key decision in building the Knowledge Centre was to move away from downloadable documents.
Nidhi Patel, Intranet and Digital Employee Experience specialist, AFCA.
“If people can download a document, they will, and once it’s saved locally, it quickly becomes out of date,” said Nidhi Patel, Intranet and Digital Employee Experience specialist at AFCA.
“We needed one place people could trust to always have the latest guidance, and that had to be the intranet.”
To support this, large and complex documents were redesigned into structured, easy-to-read intranet pages.
A screenshot of AFCA’s intranet homepage.
To maintain the quality of the Knowledge Centre, AFCA limits who can create and update content. This helps ensure information remains accurate, consistent and easy to navigate.
To support this, AFCA invests in training and guidance for content creators. Publishers have access to structured training, templates and a dedicated practice environment where they can build confidence before publishing live content.
“We want people to feel confident creating content, but also supported to get it right,” Nidhi said.
“Having a safe place to practise and clear guidance makes a big difference.”
AFCA also places strong emphasis on content quality, readability and clear ownership, which aligns with its high Quality score within SWOOP Analytics’ Health Score.
Rather than allowing long, unstructured pages, the team works closely with authors to improve how information is presented.
“Our content can be very technical and very long, so we work with authors to break it into smaller, more manageable pages,” Nidhi said.
Simon Moeller, Intranet and Digital Employee Experience specialist, AFCA.
Attention to detail also matters.
“We focus on the small things, like using proper headings and structuring pages clearly,” said Simon Moeller, Intranet and Digital Employee Experience specialist at AFCA.
“Those details make a real difference to how easy content is to read and use.”
Each page has clear ownership, with authors and subject matter experts identified.
“We make it clear who owns each page and who the expert is,” Simon said.
“So if someone has a question, they know exactly who to go to.”
This transparency supports confident decision making and builds trust in the information.
The importance of data
Data also plays an important role in how AFCA manages and improves its intranet.
SWOOP Analytics provides insight into how content is used, helping the team identify what is working well and where improvements are needed.
“Data opens up possibilities,” Nidhi said.
“It highlights issues people might be struggling with that you wouldn’t otherwise see.”
For the AFCA team, the 2026 benchmarking results provided both validation and direction.
“We were thrilled to be recognised,” Nidhi said.
“It showed us we’re on the right track, while also helping us see where we can keep improving.”
By linking governance decisions to measurable outcomes, AFCA continues to refine how the intranet supports knowledge management and employee experience.
“I love the data,” Simon said.
“It helps us understand what’s working and where to focus next.”
