"I see conciliation as a positive move," Dr Powell, who is a spokeswoman for Acclaim Otago, an ACC claimant support group, said.
Overall changes to the ACC disputes resolution system announced by ACC last week could help claimants gain better access to justice, she said.
"As always, I am cautious about saying it will be fabulous.
"But it certainly has the potential to going some way to levelling the playing field," she said.
The recent changes include establishing a new conciliation service, called "Talk-Meet-Resolve", and adding another review provider The Independent Complaint and Review Authority (ICRA), to the existing FairWay Resolution Ltd.
Dr Powell said that conciliation potentially meant people would be able to resolve issues earlier without having to find the money to fund it themselves, and later reviews and court action might be avoided.
"Certainly, from Acclaim's perspective, it will be a huge benefit to be able to refer people to this service."
She was concerned about other matters, including about the funding and workload capacity of the new system.
The new initiatives went some way to responding to recommendations made by Miriam Dean QC in a 2016 independent report on the ACC dispute resolution system.
It was also a good idea to have more than one provider for review hearings, as this allowed some element of choice in service provider, she said.
Asked about the proposed use of pre-review telephone conference calls, Dr Powell said Ms Dean had proposed this approach, which was "an excellent way of getting everyone on the same page about an issue".
Having video conferencing available to people in their own town was also potentially a good idea, avoiding the need for travel beyond familiar surroundings and support people.
Asked about resourcing issues, ACC spokesman James Funnell said the changes were being made to make things easier and better for customers.
"Obviously, it's in our interests to ensure that the resourcing is adequate," Mr Funnell said.
The matter would be kept under review, and if more resources were needed, ACC would look to do so, he said.
