ARUN DISTRICT COUNCIL

GUIDELINES FOR THE CORPORATE COMPLAINTS PROCEDURE

Arun's Corporate Complaints Procedure came into operation in January 1993 following a complete review of the previous procedure. Since then it has been subject to annual reviews and certain changes have been introduced to strengthen the process. However the aim has remained: to have a procedure in place which is easy to understand and simple for the public to follow.

These guidelines are intended to explain the procedure in more detail for operational reference by managers and staff. The last section includes some of the questions about the procedure most commonly asked by staff - and the answers.

If anything is not clear, or if you have thoughts as to how the procedure could be improved based on your own personal experience of dealing with complaints, please contact Ian Sumnall, Chief Executive, on ext 37600.

WHY DO WE - AND THE PUBLIC - NEED A COMPLAINTS PROCEDURE?

Listening to the public and monitoring our performance are two of the essential elements of the District Council's Working for the Public programme, adopted as Council policy in January 1988.

A further external factor influencing the need for the Council to have a corporate approach to complaints is that the Local Government Ombudsman will not usually act on a complaint until a council has investigated the matter. That means that if a complaint does reach the stage of being investigated by the Ombudsman, he or she will certainly be looking to see how well our procedure dealt with the problem in the first place.

There are several reasons why an organisation committed to customer care, performance management and Best Value needs a good sound system of dealing with complaints:

What the complaints will do, over time, is to reveal to managers where existing systems are inadequate. The fact that customers feel a need to complain will be recorded and periodic analysis will show where problems are recurring. This may highlight the need for a transfer of resources, service improvement, a change in procedures, more staff training, better information to the public etc.

Complaining to any large organisation can be a bewildering experience. Local authorities are often seen as faceless, bureaucratic and inefficient. The first objective of a good complaints procedure, therefore, has to be to provide an effective means for a customer to make complaints and have them resolved.

Complaints can occur because of poor communications between the Council, its staff and the public. Others arise because information about Council services is not clearly and widely publicised. Or complaints can occur because we have made an error.

The clearer customers' understanding of what they have a right to expect from us, the more focused and appropriate their representations will be.

Research has shown that most people don't complain - the average business does not hear from 96% of its unhappy customers. But a customer who has an unpleasant experience will tell an average of ten other people about it. If something is wrong, we need to know. We may not always be able to put things right, but we can at least explain why not.

WHAT IS A COMPLAINT?

The Council's definition of a complaint is the one suggested by the Commission for Local Administration in England (the Local Government Ombudsman). That is:

"A complaint is an expression of dissatisfaction, however made, about the standard of service, actions or lack of action by the Council or its staff affecting an individual customer or a group of customers"

The complaints procedure does not cover:

It is important to understand what ISN'T a complaint as far as our procedure is concerned. It's not the person complaining about a wasp's nest in the garden - that is a request for a service. The customer who telephones us to complain about a smoky bonfire polluting the air may term this as a complaint but it is not a complaint about Council service provision. The customer is reporting an incident and expecting us to do something about it. If we then fail to respond effectively, within a reasonable timescale, and the customer has to ring back - then that could become a complaint.

Similarly it is not the company complaining that its planning application has been turned down, for which there is a defined appeal procedure.

An unpopular decision taken by a Cabinet or one of the Council's regulatory Committees, such as Development Control, may bring letters and telephone calls of objection. These are not complaints according to our definition as long as the decision was taken fairly with the relevant facts correctly presented. However they still need to be answered, by the Cabinet Member, Committee Chairman, Director or appropriate Head of Service, explaining the reasons why the decision was taken.

DEALING WITH COMPLAINTS

The Council would always prefer to resolve a problem on the spot and the initial approach to handling customer complaints should be to try to satisfy the customer at the earliest opportunity.

If someone is upset because their rubbish has not been collected they don't want to be told that their complaint will be acknowledged within five days, that we will send them a form to fill in and that they will receive a progress report or a full and detailed response from us in 25 working days. They just want their bin emptied!

Complaints leaflets, which include a form, are available in all sections. If a customer wants to make a formal complaint, having been unable to resolve the problem at source, then they should be given or sent a complaints leaflet to fill in. If needed, staff should help the customer to fill in the form. If the contact is by telephone, staff should ask if the customer wants a form to be sent or would prefer to fill it in over the telephone. If the former, the form should be sent with a prepaid envelope for return to Janice Ayling, Corporate Complaints Administrator, who administers the procedure. If the latter, details should be taken down over the telephone, read back to the complainant, then the form sent to Janice in the General Administration Section on the first floor in the Civic Centre. Janice will then send the complaint form to the complainant with a covering letter to ensure that they are happy with the wording of their complaint. They will be asked to sign the complaint form and return it to Janice and to include any amendments if necessary.

Stage One - Fast Track

When a complaint is first received by the Corporate Complaints Administrator and being satisfied that it comes within our definition of a complaint (see above), the Corporate Complaints Administrator will check whether the complaint should be dealt with fast track. In this case Janice will contact the relevant member of staff and ask him or her if the matter can be resolved straightaway without going through a formal process of investigation. Janice will advise the complainant what is being done and by whom. Service areas which operate their own complaints procedure

are operating within this "first stage". If complaints cannot be resolved speedily, they should be referred to the corporate procedure. The response time for a Corporate Complaints Stage 1 is set at 10 days.

Planning currently have their own complaints procedure for dealing with first stage complaints. There is currently a response period of 25 working days.

During the course of daily business, comments and minor complaints are made to Council staff about the services we provide. It would not be feasible for every such complaint to be transferred to a form, referred to appropriate officers, acknowledged by letter, followed up, and monitored. Our customers themselves would no doubt see this as over zealous and a waste of resources.

What we should do, however, is to ensure that comments are welcomed and listened to and, where appropriate, information passed to people who can use it to improve services. The Council's Working for the Public Group will always be interested to hear from staff about ideas for improving customer service especially where these are suggested by customers - special yellow forms are available for this purpose or contact Jaqui Ball on extension 37602. Passing on ideas is one thing that every member of staff can do to help our customers.

Stage Two

It is those complaints which cannot be dealt with straightaway that feed into the second, more formal stage of the complaints procedure. This is where a complaint is investigated by an independent Senior officer of the Council. The period for response to complaints at Stage 2 is 20 working days.

The role of the Corporate Complaints Administrator

Janice Ayling is the Corporate Complaints Administrator who administers the complaints procedure. Janice will:

[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:23:00 2007 ]THE COMPLAINTS FORM

Complaints forms are available in all offices and centres but it should also be possible for the customer to give the information to whoever they are dealing with and expect it to find its way into the system. To the customer, we are all "the Council" and it is the job of the member of staff who takes the call or meets the customer to help with form-filling if this is needed and explain what will happen next.

The form has been kept as simple as possible. Basically it asks two questions:

In answering the first of these questions it is obviously helpful if as much detail as possible can be given, particularly dates, reference numbers for correspondence, and the names of officers involved.

Complaint forms are also available via the Council's website at www.arun.gov.uk. The guidance notes and form can be found on the home page of the website under the section headed “Do It Online” or `C' under the A-Z. The form can be completed on line, but cannot currently be submitted on line, but must be sent to the Civic Centre.

RECEIVING COMPLAINTS

Complaints will find their way into the system by different routes - by letter, email, telephone or by personal call. Some may be referred by a Ward Councillor. Complaints may also be received via Public Question Time (at Council or Cabinet) at the start of our Cabinet and Full Council Meetings.

If the customer complains over the telephone, you can either send him or her a form, together with a prepaid envelope, OR fill in a form at the time, reading over to the complainant what you have written, then send the form to Janice in the General Administration Section on the first floor in the Civic Centre. Janice will then send the complaint form to the complainant with a covering letter to ensure that they are happy with the wording of their complaint. They will be asked to sign the complaint form and return it to Janice and to include any amendments if necessary.

Completed forms received in the post will go straight to Janice Ayling.

If the complainant comes into the Council offices in person, once again every effort should be made to deal with the problem on the spot. If this cannot be done, then give the customer a complaints form to fill in and offer any help needed in completing it. Once this is done, pass the completed form to Janice Ayling for processing.

Complaints received at Public Question Time should be processed by the appropriate lead officer.

ALWAYS ACCEPT THAT A CUSTOMER HAS A RIGHT TO COMPLAIN AND PROVIDE AS MUCH ASSISTANCE AS POSSIBLE

PERSISTENT COMPLAINERS

We have taken advice from the Local Government Ombudsman on this point. When investigating complaints, the Ombudsman has a process by which complainants can ask for a review, if unhappy with an initial decision, and may be asked to supply additional information/evidence which is considered material to the decision. There is then a cut-off point at which the Ombudsman will advise the complainant that any further correspondence will be acknowledged and read but unless it contains new material information it will then be placed on file and no further action taken.

However if people complain on a regular basis about different matters then we must investigate each matter. Just because the people concerned are "known complainers" should not prevent their complaint(s) being fully and fairly investigated.

COMPLAINTS WHICH ARE "OUT OF TIME"

Once again we have sought advice on this from the Local Government Ombudsman. The Ombudsman's own guideline is that a complaint will not be entertained unless it was made to the commissioner or a member of the authority concerned within twelve months from the day on which the complainant first had notice of the matters alleged in the complaint.

However the Ombudsman has discretion to accept such complaints out of time if there are good reasons for doing so such as serious injustice which needs to be remedied, or if the complainant had good reason for not complaining sooner.

From a practical point of view, the complaint must be capable of being investigated so, for example, there will be questions about whether the relevant documents, members of staff, Councillors are still available.

It is suggested that we should follow the guidance of the Ombudsman in this matter.

ROLE OF INVESTIGATING OFFICERS

A rota of Investigating Officers has been established. Janice will allocate complaints to these people and name them on the acknowledgement letter which goes to complainants. Investigating Officers are all senior members of staff - this is one of the undertakings given to complainants - and will never be responsible for the area which is the subject of the complaint. The Investigating Officer role is considered to be part of the corporate responsibilities of staff at this senior level and an Investigating Officer cannot refuse to take on a complaint. It may be that, if the Investigating Officer will be away on holiday for a long period of time, he/she may "miss a turn" - but pressure of work, in itself, is not a reason for being unable to accept this responsibility. All Investigating Officers are busy people! We help each other if we share this particular workload fairly. Janice will allocate an official complaint to the next appropriate person on the list and if that person is unable to take on the complaint at that particular time, it will be the responsibility of their Director to reallocate the complaint.

A "buddy" system is in place to help new Investigating Officers by assigning a more experienced officer to help with early complaint investigations and “difficult” complaints will be given to appropriately experienced investigators.

GUIDELINES FOR INVESTIGATING OFFICERS

Each complaint will vary and therefore it is important that Investigating Officers understand exactly what the complaint is about. How a complaint is received should not make a difference to how it is investigated although it may mean that more information is initially available, e.g. a written complaint may be more detailed than a telephone complaint.

When Janice advises an Investigating Officer that he or she has been assigned a complaint to investigate, she will provide a red folder for all file notes. These folders have a simple check list for Investigating Officers to record each step of the investigation. Once the investigation is complete, the file should be returned to Janice without delay; if a review is called for then Ian Sumnall (or another Director if Ian Sumnall has an “interest” in the complaint) or the Chairman/Vice-Chairman of the appropriate Committee (currently the Committee is Performance Scrutiny Committee and the Chairman is Councillor Dr James Walsh and the Vice-Chairman is Councillor Mrs Maconachie) will look first at these file notes before calling for further information.

As agreed with the consultant advising the Council on data protection, the red files will be kept for three years and then disposed of. While the files are “live” they are confidential and file notes will not be disclosed to any third party, with the exception of the Local Government Ombudsman or if a data subject access request is received under the Data Protection Act. If such a request is received it must be forwarded to Maureen Chaffe as Data Protection Officer. If the request/complaint also asks for all relevant documentation seek advice of Maureen Chaffe or Sue Fairs-Browning.[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:23:00 2007 ].[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:23:00 2007 ]

The following are guidelines on how to investigate a complaint, although not all these will necessarily apply to every complaint:

1. Prepare a plan of approach

2. Investigation process

3. Interview process

Plan and prepare each interview:

Formulate questions aimed at

- resolving apparent contradictions

- corroborating information

- bringing out the "hidden" factors e.g. pressure on staff at the time

- providing reasons e.g. for communication failure, delays, etc.

4. Tone of interview

5. Response to complaint and follow-up

When responding to the complainant, please:

“If you are not happy with my conclusions, then you have the right to request a review of your complaint. This review will either be carried out by Ian Sumnall, the Chief Executive (or another Director if Mr Sumnall has an “interest” in your complaint) or a Senior Councillor (currently the Chairman or Vice-Chairman of the Performance Scrutiny Committee). The choice is yours as to whether it is Mr Sumnall or a Councillor. If you decide on this course of action you will need to make a request within 3 weeks of the date of my letter and a further review will be carried out. A response will be sent within 15 working days of receiving your request in writing”

It is the responsibility of the Investigating Officer to ensure that in cases where operational issues have arisen out of the investigation, these are drawn to the attention of the relevant officer/service head. This could involve confirming in writing the actions that are required to ensure that a reoccurrence of the complaint should not happen.

Service heads must respond within ten working days to recommendations made by Investigating Officers. This response should be sent to the Investigating Officer and included in the "red file". If the complainant agrees, Ward Members should be notified of the outcome, but recognising the requirements of Data Protection.

Stage 3 - If the Customer is still not satisfied

If the customer is still dissatisfied with the outcome of the investigation of the complaint then he or she may request a review by contacting the Chief Executive.

The Chief Executive/the Chairman or Vice-Chairman of the appropriate Committee will carry out a review within 15 working days of receiving a request to do so. That review will look at the way the investigation has been conducted, as well as the detail of the complaint. Investigating Officers will need to provide the Chief Executive/Chairman or Vice-Chairman with their file notes of the investigation immediately, as the timescale for review is short. They will need to be available to talk through the issues with the Chief Executive/Chairman or Vice-Chairman if required as part of his review.

Stage 4 - The Local Government Ombudsman

The customer's final route, if still dissatisfied with the result of the Stage 3 review, is to file a complaint to the Local Government Ombudsman. There is a leaflet explaining the role of the Ombudsman available from all Council offices. Updated information on the Local Government Ombudsman is available via their website: www.lgo.org.uk or their advice line on 0845 602 1983.

Where a complaint has passed through all the stages of our complaints procedure and it is clear that there will be no "meeting of minds", the final letter from the Chief Executive/Chairman or Vice-Chairman explaining the Council's position should enclose a copy of this leaflet. It is hoped, however, that the operation of an effective complaints procedure will reduce the number of complaints brought to the Ombudsman's attention.

The processing of complaints and co-ordination of responses to the Ombudsman is handled by Julie Pearce, Head of Customer Services, and all matters in connection with the Ombudsman should be channelled through her, rather than direct contact being made with the Ombudsman by other officers.

ROLE OF THE MONITORING OFFICER

Each Council has to appoint a Monitoring Officer. In Arun's case, this is the Solicitor to the Council, Wendy Ashenden-Bax.

Her role as Monitoring Officer is to report to the Council on any decision or proposal of the Council, its Cabinet, Committees or Officers which has given rise to, or is likely to give rise to, a contravention of law or statutory code of practice or administration.

When a complaint is made about a Councillor, this should be referred to Wendy Ashenden-Bax in the first instance.

When a serious complaint is made to the Council about misconduct or impropriety on the part of a Chief Officer or any Member of the Council, the initial investigation may fall to the Monitoring Officer or Chief Internal Auditor, or appropriate senior officer as required by the Chief Executive. If there is evidence of criminal activity, the police will be involved as a matter of course at the earliest opportunity.

Officers also need to be aware of the existence of employment legislation, commonly referred to under the title of Whistleblowing. This is primarily to ensure that any officer/Member, when alleging serious misconduct within the Council's operation, has the right to confidentiality when revealing their concerns. In the first instance, the officer should approach Sue Fairs-Browning, Chief Internal Auditor.

The Council's procedure for dealing with Whistleblowing is not something which a member of the public has recourse to, as complaints from them are dealt with in accordance with this complaints process.

REDRESS

Where a complaint is found to be justified, consideration needs to be given to the question of a remedy. The remedy needs to be appropriate to the complaint. An apology will normally be appropriate and an assurance - and action - to ensure that the same problem does not occur again.

The Commission for Local Administration in England has issued a helpful Guidance on Best Practice with regard to Remedies and Investigating Officers are advised to refer to this document when in doubt about the best way to proceed. See the Local Government Ombudsman website at www.lgo.org.uk for details.

The general principle for guidance is that, as far as possible, the complainant should be put in the same position he or she would have been in had things not gone wrong. This is another area where the assistance of a mediation service may be appropriate.

It will be necessary to determine:

Where an incident could involve insurance implications:

1. The complainant should be advised to contact his or her insurers.

2. The Council's Insurance and Risk Officer, Rod Cooper, must be informed of the incident.

Whether financial compensation should be paid and how much will depend on the circumstances. Where compensation is considered appropriate the following guidelines should be taken into account:

Delegated authority has been granted to the Chief Executive and the Council's Monitoring Officer to award compensation up to £500 where appropriate, in the event that an Investigating Officer finds in a complainant's favour. Recommendations for compensation awards in excess of £500 need to be considered by the relevant Cabinet Member. If you make an offer of redress/compensation it is a conditional offer ie. that the[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:25:00 2007 ] [Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:25:00 2007 ]only[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:25:00 2007 ] “offered” if the com[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:25:00 2007 ] com[Author ID1: at Tue Aug 14 10:25:00 2007 ]plainant agrees that the matter goes no further ie. to Stage Three with the Chief Executive/Director/Member. Please make this clear in your letter making the offer.

ANALYSIS AND REPORTS

One of the essential features of the complaints procedure is the retention and analysis of the information gained from complaints so that we can use this information in a positive way to improve services to the public.

The Chief Executive manages the overview of the complaints procedure and undertakes a corporate analysis of the types and subject matter of complaints. The Chief Executive is also responsible for producing a six-monthly and annual report of complaints, detailing numbers, types and subject matter as well as identifying trends and issues apparent through the monitoring process.

The annual report, together with a six-monthly progress report, are taken to Performance Scrutiny Committee. That Committee may decide to refer issues arising to individual Cabinet Members where more in-depth analysis and remedial action is considered necessary.

CLIENT/CONTRACTOR RELATIONSHIPS

The complaints procedure covers not only services which the Council provides directly but also those which we pay for under contractual arrangements. Where services have been contracted out it is the responsibility of the "client" side to ensure that the standards laid down are being met.

Under the complaints procedure it is the client side which is informed about problems. Where complaints are made because specifications are not being met, the information should be recorded and passed speedily to the contractor for action. The client will continue to monitor and respond to these complaints as part of contract assessments.

Future specifications should include a common clause requiring contractors to comply with the Council's complaints procedure.

Any publicity materials given to customers should contain details of the contact person on the client side.

Where the complaint cannot be dealt with within the specification, this information should be recorded for consideration when drawing up future specifications and reviewing contracts.

REQUESTS FOR MORE INFORMATION

Any request for information relating to a complaint or complainant under the Data Protection Act, as far as corporate complaints are concerned, should be directed to Maureen Chaffe, Head of Information Management. If any requests for information are received under the Freedom of Information Act regarding our Complaints Procedure, these should be directed to Sue Fairs-Browning, Chief Internal Auditor.

PUBLICITY

Good publicity is an essential element of an effective complaints procedure. Updated explanatory leaflets, which include the complaints form have been produced and will be widely available through Council offices, Citizen's Advice Bureaux, Town and Parish Councils. All service units should hold copies of this leaflet so that they can send them to people requesting information about our complaints procedure and how it works. Complainants can also be directed to the website for completion of an on-line form at www.arun.gov.uk.

Other ways of generating publicity for the procedure include:

TRAINING

New staff are introduced to the corporate complaints procedure as part of the Council's Induction Programme. It is envisaged that Investigating Officers will meet once a year to share experience and best practice, to consider the analysis of complaints, and to review the way the procedure is working.

QUESTIONS ANSWERED

This section aims to answer some of the most commonly raised questions posed by members of staff at training sessions on the complaints procedure.

1. What should I do if somebody complains to me?

Acknowledge their right to complain and help them as much as you can. If you are not able to resolve the problem, make sure accurate details are taken down on the complaints form. Do not refer them on, even if it is another department they wish to complain about. Send the completed form to Janice Ayling, Corporate Complaints Administrator.

2. Who can help me if I'm not sure what to do?

Ask your line manager for help. Janice will be able to give advice or contact Sharon Lilleywhite, Senior Admin Officer.

3. Is this another way of checking up on me/my work?

No, it is a way of finding out what our customers are unhappy about, sorting out their problems, and improving our services. It is not the intention of the complaints procedure to apportion blame for failures of individuals but, wherever possible, to provide a service with which our customers can feel satisfied.

4. What happens if someone makes a complaint about me?

Complaints about Council services are usually about the way in which the service is organised, the allocation of resources or professional decisions. Only in a small number of cases are complaints about the attitude or behaviour of staff.

However, if the nature of the complaint is such that disciplinary action may have to be considered in the event of a complaint being found to be justified, then the officer will be informed of this at the outset of the enquiry into the complaint and the Council's Disciplinary Procedure will be followed.

Any officer of the Council who feels he or she has been treated unfairly during the investigation of a customer complaint can raise the issue in accordance with the Council's established Grievance Procedure. The complaints procedure is not a substitute for the Council's established grievance and disciplinary procedures which continue to operate. The rights of staff are fully protected - our aim is to improve the quality of service to our customers.

5. How can a complaints procedure help departments and the Council to improve services?

Complaints are a way of getting feedback on what our customers think about our services. We are able to learn lessons from our experiences of why things go wrong. The Arun Values stress that Arun treats people fairly if they make a mistake and emphasise the importance of learning from mistakes. We can amend our policies or practices or staff training to ensure that our services do improve.

6. How will I as an individual benefit from a complaints procedure? What's in it for me?

Improved service to our customers will increase your job satisfaction. It could well identify training opportunities or needs. It will also reduce stress - both for you and the customer.

7. How many complaints do we receive?

Not as many as you might expect! In 2004/05 the number of complaints investigated formally through the procedure under Stage 2 was 29, 2005/2006 was 21 and 2006/07 was 26.

8. Is the complaints procedure computerised?

At first the procedure was operated manually but it is now computerised. That is why the complaints form includes the necessary reference to details being logged on a computer, to comply with the Data Protection Act.

9. How do we measure that a person is satisfied once they receive a response to the complaint?

Satisfaction is not easy to measure - the response may not be the one the customer wants to hear but they may be satisfied, despite this, that the complaint has been dealt with fairly and efficiently. A survey was undertaken during 2006 to test customer satisfaction on the way their complaint was investigated. The findings were that the public viewed our process as bureaucratic, slow and not totally independent. Some changes have been made since 2006 to address these concerns.

10. Will we note the number of forms sent out to assess how many are not returned?

One of the reasons we did not introduce a system of duplicate or triplicate forms to be filled in by complainants was the very practical one that by no means everyone who asks for a complaint form will in fact fill it in and return it.

11. What happens about anonymous complaints?

Our policy is not to deal with anonymous complaints. However, Councillors have made the point that they are sometimes asked to take up a complaint on behalf of someone who does not wish to be named - but is known to them. Those complaints will be dealt with.

12. Is the central register to be open to public inspection?

No. The register is for internal action. However the annual report of complaints is a public document available to all.

13. If a member of the public insists their enquiry is a complaint, even if we wouldn't consider it one under our definition what do we do?

The customer is always right - until proved otherwise! Treat it positively and deal with it in a way which will satisfy the customer that the matter is being taken seriously. See above on the Investigating Officers' role.

14. Do "policy decisions" include departmental policies, e.g. what monthly payment is acceptable for Council Tax?

As far as the complaints procedure is concerned, policy decisions refer to those decisions taken by elected Councillors. Customers should be directed to Ward Members, the Council Leader, the relevant Cabinet Member, or relevant Committee Chairman.

15. What about the resource implications of requests for service which don't form part of our current operations?

We can't deliver everything our customers ask of us - but we can explain, clearly and courteously, why not in the specific cases they have drawn to our attention.

16. What happens about complaints from MPs?

These are always dealt with by the Chief Executive and will continue to be dealt with this way.

17. How will local Councillors tell us if they have had complaints?

Councillors have access, just as staff do, to complaints leaflets and forms and will introduce complaints into the system in the same way.

18. Will the performance of the staff who co-ordinate the procedure be monitored?

It will be part of the review process to see how complaints were dealt with, how quickly they were acknowledged and so on.

19. When a complaint is received which falls outside the District Council's control - such as education or highways - who is responsible for telling the complainant?

We have always taken a positive attitude towards complaints of this kind - where possible passing on the complaint to the relevant authority and explaining to the complainant what we have done on their behalf.

20. Where there is a formal right of appeal but a person also wants to complain about an officer's attitude, would the complaints procedure be implemented on the second point?

Yes if the customer wanted to make this a formal complaint.

ARUN'S CORPORATE COMPLAINTS SYSTEM

AND LINK TO LOCAL GOVERNMENT OMBUDSMAN

- 1 -

Updated: 14.8.07

Official Complaints Form

received by Corporate Complaints Administrator and acknowledged

(5 working days)

Stage 1 - Fast Track

referral back to Service Department

(10 working days)

Stage 2 - Independent investigation by senior officer

(20 working days)

Stage 3 - Review by

Ian Sumnall, Chief Executive or Chairman/Vice-Chairman of the appropriate Committee

(15 working days)

Review by

the Local Government Ombudsman if requested by complainant

If complaint already fully investigated by the relevant service area