Complaints, compliments and feedback policy and procedures

This policy describes how we receive, manage, respond to and learn from complaints, compliments and other feedback made about anything our organisation does, or doesn’t do. This policy aims to ensure all feedback is handled as efficiently and effectively as possible. All members of the PDA Society team are expected to understand and work within these procedures when dealing with a complaint.

The key aims of this policy are that:
• People who engage with the charity know how to tell us what they think and are confident that we will take them seriously.
• When things go wrong –the process for making, handling, investigating and resolving complaints is clearly laid out.
• To ensure that we will learn from all feedback that we receive and use these lessons to improve our services.

PDA Society welcomes all feedback. We recognise you might be worried about asking us to do things differently or about telling us when we’ve done something wrong. Equally it can be embarrassing complimenting people when they’ve done something well.

This policy is intended to make it easy for you to tell us what you think in a way that is convenient for you.

Our intent is that all feedback helps us to improve, so we are committed to doing whatever we can to ensure that raising concerns or making complaints, doesn’t cause you further difficulties. We will always try to resolve difficulties informally, but in some circumstances, you may wish to make a formal complaint. We aim to resolve all complaints, promptly and sensitively.

This policy can be used by anyone wishing to feedback on what PDA Society do and how we do it. You can use these procedures whenever you have something to do say about what we do or how we do it. 

This procedure covers what we do with feedback about anything PDA Society does. Sometimes the thing you raise would be better dealt with under another procedure, such as
our Safeguarding policy, Whistleblowing policy or Disciplinary and Grievance policy. You don’t need to worry about what procedure to use. You can use this procedure to tell us what you need to and if a different policy should be used we’ll identify that and let you know what will happen next.

We will do our best to keep to the timescales in this policy but there may be occasions when we can’t – if for example the police are investigating. If this is the case, we will tell you what we are doing and why, and keep you updated about timescales.

PDA Society values feedback. If you want to tell us what you think of what we do, or make suggestions about how we can do better we really welcome that.

If you want to share something we should do more of, less of, do differently or if you want to raise a concern you are welcome to let any team member you are comfortable with know. We are happy to talk and to listen and to try and come up with solutions together. Any feedback you give us will be emailed to the People and Operations Manager who keeps a record of everything we are told. This helps us understand what we should be concentrating on.

If you don’t know who to tell please contact feedback@pdasociety.org.uk, our People and Operations Manager will make sure your feedback reaches the right person.

When we get feedback everyone at PDA Society is expected to listen and write it down so that we can learn from it as a team. They are also expected to send records of feedback to feedback@pdasociety.org.uk in order that we can identify and react to trends.

If you have difficulty discussing a concern with a particular team member, we will respect that. In these cases, the People and Operations Manager will refer you to another employee.

We understand that there are occasions when people would like to raise their concerns formally. You should use the formal complaint procedures, if you are unhappy with the response to your initial feedback, or if you think your feedback is too serious to be raised informally.

If you wish to raise a formal complaint you should contact feedback@pdasociety.org.uk and write ‘complaint’ in the subject title of your email. Our People and Operations Manager will then investigate the complaint or allocate it to a team member to investigate. If your complaint is about the CEO, it will be allocated to a trustee to investigate, and if it is about the Chair of Trustees the CEO will investigate with a nominated trustee.

It is helpful if you can be specific about your complaint including names, dates, and any other information that might be important. Here is a list of things it is helpful to include:

• Your name and contact details.
• The names of any team members involved.
• What you are complaining about, being as specific as you can about incidents and when they took place.
• Details of any steps already taken to resolve the complaint.
• Details of what actions you feel might resolve the problem.
• Copies of any documentation which supports the complaint.
• If you are complaining on behalf of someone else – that you have their permission to do so and how we can be assured this is the case.

Please note that if you are complaining about something that happened more than 6 months ago it may be difficult for us to establish what happened – for this reason complaints older than 6 months will only be investigated with CEO (or if the complaint is about the CEO – the Chair of Trustees) approval.

You should receive an acknowledgement of your complaint within 5 working days. That acknowledgement will either:

• Introduce you to the team member looking into your complaint.
• Or if your complaint is over 6 months old, let you know what action will be taken about it.

If you receive an introduction to a team member, within 5 working days of that introductory email, you will receive an email from that team member in which they will:

• Ask for any further information from you that will help them understand the complaint you have raised.
• Let you know about any other action they are taking (for example checking our records or talking to team members) to help them understand what happened and why.
• Let you know the date by which you can expect their full response (this will normally be within 25 days of this email – though in some circumstances could take longer).
• You are welcome to make enquiries about the current status of the complaint at any time.

If you wish to withdraw your complaint, we will ask you to confirm this in writing.

Within 35 working days of your raising a formal complaint you should receive an email letting you know the organisations reflections on concerns raised and any actions we are going to take as a result.

You will be offered the opportunity to discuss these with the team member who looked into your concerns if you find it helpful. The email you received will have been reviewed by another member of the management team to check that the response is fair, reasonable and proportionate.

At this stage you can make several choices:

• To do nothing – if after a month from receiving our findings we have not heard from you we will mark the complaint resolved. We will still undertake any actions we
  suggested in our findings email that don’t require your consent or involvement.
• To accept our findings – and let us know if/how you want to be kept informed about any changes we’ve promised to make.
• To reject our findings and take no further action. In this case we will mark your complaint unresolved. We will still undertake any actions we suggested in our findings
  email that don’t require your consent or involvement.
• To reject our findings and request a stage 2 review. In which case your complaint will progress to stage 2.

At stage 2 the CEO or a member of the trustee board will review all the information gathered so far about the complaint. They may also request further information from team members or the person who made the complaint.

They will look at the decision taken at Stage 1 and decide if they agree that it is fair and equitable. They can then choose to:

• Uphold the decision and any recommendations.
• Uphold the decision and make further recommendations.
• Make a different decision and recommendations.

This final decision will be communicated in writing within 15 working days of the appeal being received. This decision is final and will include the contact details for the Charity Commission in their capacity as the regulator of charities.

We adopt a learning first approach to complaints that we receive and recognise that all feedback provides an opportunity for us to develop and improve our service.

As soon as possible after a complaint has been dealt with, we will ensure that those involved are given individual feedback. Where our investigations identify a need to improve or review our systems, these identified needs will be presented by the CEO to the Trustees for consideration and remedy at the next Trustee meeting. Any agreed changes will be kept under review.

We will undertake ongoing monitoring of all complaints to identify trends and assess training requirements.

We will record the lessons learned and review all complaints quarterly in order to offer the best service and continuous improvement.

Where a serious incident has occurred, we will report the matter to the Charity Commission and, if appropriate, any other relevant appropriate external bodies. We will always adhere to our statutory obligations and seek advice in respect of these if they are unclear.

Further action, including disciplinary action, the cessation of a person’s contract with the charity, withdrawal of the offer to a volunteer or other such consequence may be instigated where necessary.

The charity understands that bringing a complaint can be stressful for the complainant. The charity also has a duty of care to the team handling the complaint.

If a complaint is brought in an unreasonable manner with unreasonable behaviours, then the complainant will be made aware that the charity considers this unacceptable, and they will be asked to cease. Examples of unreasonable behaviours include, but are not limited to, actions which are out of proportion to the nature of the complaint, personally harassing, or being unjustifiably repetitious or obsessive.

Where complaints are deemed vexatious or the unreasonable behaviours do not stop, the complainant will be notified in writing that no further correspondence will be entered into on the matter in question. A decision to restrict contact may be reconsidered if the complainant goes on to demonstrate changed behaviour. The decision to restrict contact can be appealed in writing to the Chair of Trustees using the contact details noted above to make a complaint. The Chair of Trustees’ decision is final.

In particularly serious cases of vexatious or unreasonable behaviours, these matters may be referred to the police and the charity may consider taking appropriate legal action against the complainant to safeguard the charity and its team members from harm.

The charity keeps full records of all feedback, complaints, investigations and responses in keeping with its obligations under data protection legislation and regulation. It is the People and Operations Manager s responsibility to keep these records and to allocate stage 1 complaints to the team where there isn’t capacity to investigate themselves. All records are kept securely. These records include:

• The date feedback was received, by who and how (verbally or in writing).
• Details of formal complaints and the results of the investigation.
• Copies of any communications and records of telephone conversations and meetings.
• The outcome of the complaint and any action that we took as a result.
• Correspondence between the individual and the organisation.

PDA Society expects all employees, volunteers, trustees and contractors to record any feedback they received to feedback@pdasociety.org.uk in order that accurate records are
kept and action taken. Failure to report concerns or complaints may be treated as a disciplinary matter.

Trustees will review any trends in feedback, particularly complaints, at least annually and take decisions around any strategic changes needed to ensure our work is of high quality.

* In the event of a serious issue, the People and Operations Manager will consult with the CEO
to consider any policy / procedure changes that may be required before the review date.