Decision details

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.