We handle thousands of complaints each year, and we want to give everyone the opportunity to feedback on the service and the decision they receive from us.
We hope that most people will be satisfied with the contact they have with us and we welcome positive feedback. But we recognise not everyone will be happy with our decision or with the way we handled their complaint. We also welcome critical feedback that helps us improve.
We are committed to learning and improving as a result of the feedback we receive.
How and when to give feedback
You can give us feedback at any time during our handling of your complaint. Please discuss this with the person whose service you are feeding back on or their manager as a starting point. If you are raising concerns about our service, you should tell us about these within a month of the service issue you wish to complain about. This is so we can quickly take action to put things right. If you contact us about this after a month, we might not be able to consider your concerns.
If you think we made the wrong decision
Our decisions are final and there is no further stage to our process. If you disagree with our decision or need further explanation, you will need to first raise this with the person who handled your case.
If they or their manager cannot resolve things, they might ask you to provide us with the following explanation and/or evidence:
- why you think our decision is wrong
- what you would like to happen next
- any supporting or new evidence.
Please note that we will not treat a repeat of your complaint issues as a challenge to our decision.
You should focus on why you think our decision is wrong and provide any relevant supporting information. We will use the information you provide to consider your concerns and only seek further information from you if we need it.
The person who handled your case, or their manager, will explain whether or not we will consider your complaint further. If your case concerns a more serious injustice or matter of public interest, and you have set out evidence for why our decision could be wrong, someone who is independent of this decision may look into it.
You should tell the person who handled your case why you think we have got it wrong within a month of our decision. If you contact us about this after a month, we may not be able to consider your concerns. If you think this timescale will be a problem for you, you should discuss this with your case handler before the month passes.
If after raising your concerns with us you remain unhappy with the decision, it is open to you to seek independent legal advice about your options to challenge the decision through the Court system.
If you are happy with our service
If you think there is something we have done well, we would like to hear from you. If you would like to tell us about your experience, please let the person handling your complaint know. They will capture and share your feedback to support our learning and so we can recognise and promote excellence.
Page updated to reflect approach to feedback about our service from 27 August 2021 onwards.