Decision

Summary of
Decision
The Cabinet Member for Communities has
approved an amendment to the Council’s Complaints Policy to
change the time that a resident has to escalate a complaint to
Stage 2 from the date of the stage 1 response, from 12 months to
three months. The Cabinet Member for Communities has also approved
a new Unreasonable Complainants Policy which replaces the short
section on unreasonable complaints in the Complaints
Policy.  
 
Reasons for
Decision
The Council’s previous Complaints Policy
stated that a resident can raise a complaint within 12 months of an
issue arising. The policy also allows a resident up to 12 months
from the date of their stage 1 response to escalate their complaint
to stage 2. This can therefore mean that the complaint process can
take up to 2 years since the issue occurred for the complaint
process to be completed. 
There are several reasons why a shorter time
period to escalate a complaint would provide a better service to
our residents, including: 

When things go wrong, the Council
wants to put them right as soon as possible. Allowing  for up to a year to escalate a
complaint could potentially mean that a resident experiences a
service failure for an excessive period of time 

It is easier to investigate a
complaint at, or close to, the time the issue occurred 

Unrelated/new issues may be
incorporated into the stage 2 complaint making it harder to ensure
everything is fully investigated  

All of the above impact a resident’s
experience of the complaints process, which can give rise to more
dissatisfaction.