Administrative agencies must establish recommended response times for civil service representatives to protect them from malicious complaints this year. If civil service representatives become embroiled in disputes with complainants, such as lawsuits or claims for damages, the head of the administrative agency must provide support for legal costs, including appointing a lawyer.
The Ministry of the Interior and Safety noted on the 21st that it has distributed the "2025 Guidelines for Civil Administration and Institutional Improvement" containing these details to administrative agencies nationwide. The target administrative agencies include central ministries, local governments, educational offices, various schools, and public institutions.
This year's guidelines reflect the revised enforcement decree of the Civil Complaints Processing Act amended last year. This amendment includes measures to prevent malicious complaints and strengthen the protection of civil servants handling complaints. It allows civil servants to implement measures such as recording phone calls, setting recommended response times, and restricting or removing access for malicious complainants.
Accordingly, administrative agencies must set recommended response times for civil servants. The Ministry of the Interior and Safety has recommended a time of 20 minutes, but this can be shortened or extended by each agency. Additionally, if civil servants face verbal abuse or physical assault from complainants, support will be provided for reporting to investigative agencies and legal costs. The maximum amount of legal support will be determined by each agency.
Furthermore, this year's guidelines also include content to strengthen the management of local autonomous civil complaints and introduce newly implemented services.
Accordingly, local governments must register and maintain local autonomous civil complaints to enhance work efficiency and the convenience of using civil complaints within the organization. If a legal civil complaint is newly established due to amendments to local laws and regulations, they must reflect the processing period, relevant documents, and the appropriateness of fees in the local civil complaint processing standards, and register with the operation office's homepage as well as follow the procedures for metropolitan city or province announcements.
It was also instructed to provide detailed explanations of public services that have been improved or newly introduced and are helpful in daily life. It is planned to guide the issuance of mobile resident registration cards that have been implemented nationwide since March and mobile resident registration cards that can be used in Samsung Wallet starting in April.
The Ministry of the Interior and Safety will hold explanatory sessions in four regions from the 22nd to May 2nd to ensure this year's guidelines can be applied and implemented at civil complaint sites.
Lee Yong-seok, head of the Digital Government Innovation Office at the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, said, "We will create a safe civil complaint office for both citizens and public servants, and we will improve various policies and services to make civil complaint services more convenient to use."