Photo: RNZ / Dom Thomas
The country's employment dispute resolution service is facing "significant demand", leading to wait times of roughly 10 weeks.
Rising unemployment was already putting pressure on mediation services in May last year when wait times were as long as seven weeks.
The Employment Mediation Services website is now warning those needing assistance can expect a ten-week wait due to "significant demand".
Workplace Relations Minister Brooke van Velden was not aware of the delay when asked about it. She said she would look into the numbers - adding delays can be caused by parties refusing to agree to a date.
"The difficulty of course with the mediation service is sometimes people don't want to come to the table, even for a date that actually does work for them.
"It is actually quite difficult for the mediation services to get everybody in the room together - especially when there's one party intentionally delaying the process."
But Labour workplace relations spokesperson Camilla Belich said the delays were a direct result of government cuts at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.
"There have been a lot of job cuts, a lot of redundancies. From my understanding... there aren't enough people to do the work and that's why people are facing delays."
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