What Are Scope Customers Saying?

Listening to the Experiences of People Who Use Scope Disability Services

An SLB Blogs Customer Experience Review

When people use a disability service provider, the most important voices are the people receiving the service.

Not employees.

Not executives.

Not politicians.

The customers and participants who depend on the service every day.

Scope (Aust) Ltd is a major Australian disability service provider offering services including Supported Independent Living, social and community participation, employment services, therapy and psychology, and communication supports. Scope reported supporting 4,574 clients during the 2024–25 financial year, including 1,305 people in Supported Independent Living.

So what are customers actually saying?

A mixed picture

Publicly available customer feedback presents a much more complicated picture than simply saying Scope is either "good" or "bad."

Some customers describe positive relationships with support workers and say staff help them with things they need.

At the same time, Scope's own published participant feedback identifies concerns about staffing consistency, staff behaviour, independence and whether people feel genuinely in control of their own lives.

That matters.

A disability service can have caring individual workers while customers can still experience problems with the broader service system.

"I like the people"

One of the positive themes appearing in Scope's published participant feedback is that some customers genuinely like the people supporting them.

One participant described their home positively, saying:

"I like the people. We have a laugh. It's my home."

Another participant said:

"I like it here – they help me with things."

These comments demonstrate something important: individual relationships between participants and support workers can make a significant difference to someone's experience of disability services.

For many people, a good support worker isn't simply somebody who completes a shift.

They can become an important part of a person's life.

But customers also raise concerns about staff

Scope's published customer feedback also contains criticism of some staff practices.

Participants reported concerns about staff being overly controlling, staff not taking ownership of responsibilities and staff behaviour within supported accommodation.

For example, Scope's published feedback includes a participant saying:

"Make some staff take ownership."

Another participant expressed concern about a staff member being "bossy."

There was also feedback about staff complaining among themselves and customers noticing it.

These comments raise an important question:

When a participant notices problems with the way staff behave, how effectively is that concern dealt with?

"Where are you going?"

One of the most significant themes in Scope's historical participant feedback concerns independence and control.

One participant described being repeatedly asked questions about where they were going and what they were doing.

The participant's response was essentially about wanting control over their own life and decisions.

This is an important issue across disability services.

Support should not mean taking control away from the person receiving support.

For an NDIS participant, independence, choice and control are fundamental concepts.

The question should therefore be:

Is the service helping the person live the life they want — or simply managing the person's daily life?

Customers want to do more for themselves

Another piece of Scope's published participant feedback was:

"I would to be able to do more for myself."

That short statement says a lot.

A good disability service should ideally support people to develop independence rather than unintentionally creating dependence.

Sometimes the most successful support is not doing something for a person.

It is helping them do it themselves.

Worries about who will be working

Scope's customer feedback also includes concerns about staffing consistency.

One participant said:

"I worry about who will be on and do I like them and are they any good."

For somebody receiving daily disability support, this is significant.

A participant may depend on workers for personal care, medication-related routines, community access, communication, transport, household tasks and other important parts of daily life.

Changing staff can therefore be much more than an ordinary workplace roster change.

It can affect someone's sense of safety, comfort and trust.

The bigger safeguarding question

Scope's customer experience cannot be discussed without acknowledging the serious safeguarding issues that have previously surrounded the organisation.

In 2024, footage involving Scope-supported resident Lee-Anne Mackey led to significant public concern. Scope subsequently commissioned an independent review examining the services and support provided to her, complaints received, responses to those complaints and broader systemic issues including the power relationship between clients, families and Scope.

The review examined Scope's complaints, incident-management and knowledge-management systems and considered compliance with relevant legislation, NDIS requirements and Scope policies.

This is important because customer experience is not only about whether somebody likes their support worker.

It is also about:

• whether complaints are taken seriously;

• whether safeguarding concerns are acted upon;

• whether customers feel safe speaking up;

• whether families are listened to;

• whether incidents are properly investigated;

• whether people have genuine choice and control; and

• whether problems lead to meaningful change.

Scope says it is listening to customers

It is also important to acknowledge what Scope itself is doing to obtain customer feedback.

Scope has introduced a Client Experience (CX) Tracker, allowing clients to provide feedback about their service experience. Scope says the tool is designed to make feedback accessible and empowering, including through simplified language, images and optional audio.

Scope says CX Tracker devices are available at 100 sites across NSW and Victoria and that responses are anonymous and reported at group level, although safeguarding alerts can be triggered where a response indicates a potential immediate safety or wellbeing concern.

Scope has also established a Client Advisory Panel, intended to give customers a direct role in influencing decision-making and organisational change.

These initiatives are important because customers should not simply be the recipients of services.

They should have a voice in how those services operate.

But feedback systems only matter if something changes

This is where SLB Blogs believes the real test begins.

It is relatively easy for an organisation to create:

• a survey;

• a feedback form;

• a customer panel;

• a complaints process; or

• a new customer-experience program.

The harder question is:

What happens after a customer speaks up?

Does the organisation change the service?

Does management investigate?

Does the participant receive an explanation?

Does the family receive an appropriate response?

Are recurring problems identified?

Are staff held accountable where appropriate?

And most importantly:

Does the customer actually experience an improvement?

Scope's own complaints process

Scope states that customer feedback and complaints are valued and that complaints are intended to be acknowledged within one business day. Scope also provides information about external organisations that customers can approach, including the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission and other relevant bodies.

That external pathway is particularly important.

Customers should not feel that they have to rely exclusively on the organisation they are complaining about.

The SLB Blogs view

After looking specifically at publicly available customer and participant information, the picture of Scope is mixed.

There are customers who clearly value their relationships with staff and the assistance they receive.

There are also customers whose publicly documented feedback raises concerns about:

staff consistency, independence, staff conduct, control, communication and the quality of support.

And there are serious historical safeguarding matters that demonstrate why customer complaints and participant voices must be taken seriously.

SLB Blogs does not believe it is fair to judge every Scope employee or every Scope service based on the experience of one customer.

Equally, it would be wrong to dismiss the experiences of customers who have raised concerns.

The people who receive the service should be at the centre

Disability services exist because people need support.

That means the ultimate question should always be:

"What is life actually like for the person receiving the service?"

Are they listened to?

Are they respected?

Are they safe?

Do they have choice?

Do they have control?

Are they supported to become more independent?

Can they complain without fear?

Are their families heard?

Do staff understand their individual needs?

And when something goes wrong, does somebody actually fix it?

These are the questions that matter.

Final word

Scope is a large disability organisation supporting thousands of Australians.

Its customers' experiences are therefore diverse.

Some people may have excellent support.

Others may have experienced frustration or serious concerns.

The responsibility of a major disability provider is not to pretend that every experience will be perfect.

It is to listen when something goes wrong, learn from it, protect people from harm and continuously improve.

At SLB Blogs, we believe the strongest disability-service organisations are not those that claim they never make mistakes.

They are the organisations willing to listen to the people they support — especially when those people say:

"Something isn't right."

A note from SLB Blogs

This article focuses specifically on publicly available customer, participant and family perspectives. Employee review sites have deliberately not been used as evidence for the customer-experience findings in this article.

Customer feedback can represent individual experiences and should not automatically be treated as evidence that every Scope customer has experienced the same thing.

Scope should also be given the opportunity to respond to any specific allegations or concerns raised by customers.

The customer should always have a voice.