Complaint Policy and information

Shipston Medical Centre takes complaints from patients and their relatives very seriously.  The Medical Centre aims to investigate complaints thoroughly and learn from the outcomes of these investigations.

The complaints system aims to be:

• Fair
• Open and transparent 
• Confidential
• A simple and swift process
• A learning opportunity for the organisation

Responsible person for complaints & complaints manager: Rachel Vial, Business Partner.  Where the Business Partner is absent the Admin Manager will be delegated to undertake the Business Partner’s responsibilities with regard to complaints.

Information for patients

How to Complain

We hope that most problems can be sorted out easily and quickly, often at the time they arise and with the person concerned.  If your problem cannot be sorted out in this way and you wish to make a complaint, we would like you to let us know as soon as possible, ideally within a matter of days or at most a few weeks, because this will enable us to establish what happened more easily. 

Under the national procedure you have 12 months in which to raise a complaint, from the occurrence giving rise to the complaint or from the time that you become aware of the matter. It is at the practice’s discretion whether complaints outside these timescales are responded to. 

Complaints should be addressed to the Business Partner.  It is helpful if you can be as specific as possible about your complaint and put it in writing.  However, if you would prefer to speak to someone face to face or on the telephone please contact us to request this.

What We Shall Do

We shall acknowledge your complaint within three working days. We will agree how your complaint will be dealt with and keep you informed if the investigation is not running to plan. When we look into your complaint, we shall aim to:

• Find out what happened and what went wrong and explain this
• Make it possible for you to discuss the problem with those concerned, if you would like this
• Make sure you receive an apology, where this is appropriate
• Identify what we can do to make sure the problem doesn’t happen again.

Complaining on behalf of someone else

Please note that we keep strictly to the rules of medical confidentiality.  If you are complaining on behalf of someone else, we have to know that you have their permission to do so and will discuss with you haw this might be achieved.

Getting Help With Your Complaint

If you would find it helpful to speak to someone independent of the Practice for free support and advice in pursuing issues with us, you can contact Voiceability, Tel: 0300 222 5947 or via their website https://www.voiceability.org/ 

Complaining to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman

We hope that, if you have a problem, you will use our practice complaints procedure.  We believe this will give us the best chance of putting right whatever has gone wrong and an opportunity to improve our practice.  This does not affect your right to approach the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman if you feel you cannot resolve your complaint with us. If you remain dissatisfied with the outcome of our investigation, you have 60 days in which to ask for an Independent Review. 

You can do this by phoning or writing to:

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman

Millbank Tower

Millbank

London

SW1P 4QP

Tel: 0345 015 4033

www.ombudsman.org.uk

Definition of a complaint:

Any feedback from a patient where there is dissatisfaction with any aspect of the service or care received, and, if the complaint has been made verbally, resolution of the concerns cannot be resolved within 1 working day.  All written feedback will be regarded as a complaint.

Where a third party without authority* makes a complaint, they will be encouraged to ask the patient to complain directly or provide written authority from the patient enabling the practice to communicate about the matter with the third party.

*A third party with authority might be a parent of a child aged 15 or younger, a power of attorney etc.

Timescales for making a complaint

Complaints should usually be raised within 12 months of the event, or of the person becoming aware of the event. The practice will endeavour to investigate complaints made outside of this timescale if it is still possible to investigate the complaint effectively and fairly.

Process for handling complaints

This letter will be sent to the complainant within a reasonable period.  Where there is a delay in the investigation for some reason, the complainant will be informed of this. 

Persistent and Unreasonable Contact

Persistent contact may be as a result of complainants raising genuine issues and therefore it is important to ensure this process is fair. 

Persistent and unreasonable contact can be difficult to define.  NHS England provide a definition of persistent and unreasonable complainants in their Complaints Policy (2015) and the practice has adopted this definition as one that is reasonable and considered. 

“Examples of behaviour may include those who:

• Persist in pursuing a complaint when procedures have been fully and properly implemented and exhausted.
• Do not clearly identify the precise issues that they wish to be investigated, despite reasonable efforts by staff, and where appropriate, the relevant independent advocacy services could assist to help them specify their complaint.
• Continually making unreasonable or excessive demands in terms of process and fail to accept that these may be unreasonable e.g. insist on responses to complaints being provided more urgently than is reasonable or is recognised practice.
• Continue to focus on a ‘trivial’ matter to an extent that it is out of proportion to its significance.  It is recognised that defining ‘trivial’ is subjective and careful judgement must be applied and recorded.
• Change the substance of their complaint or seek to prolong contact by continually raising further issues in relation to the original complaint.  Care must be taken not to discard new issues that are significantly different from the original issue. Each issue of concern may need to be addressed separately.
• Consume a disproportionate amount of time and resources.
• Threaten or use actual physical violence towards staff
• Have been personally abusive of verbally aggressive on more than one occasion (this may include written abuse, e.g. emails)
• Repeatedly focus on conspiracy theories and/or will not accept documented evidence as being factual.
• Make excessive telephone calls or send excessive numbers of emails or letters to staff.”

(NHS England 2015, page 18)

Where there is a suspicion that a complainant is making persistent and unreasonable contact the facts must be reviewed and considered against the above definitions.  Consideration must be given to the complaint (s) and whether or not these has been fully considered and responded to.  Consideration should be given to the state of the mental and physical health of the complainant as this may be a factor in their behaviour.   A quorum of partners (as defined by the practice agreement) will consider this information and decide if the complainant should be considered to be displaying persistent and unreasonable behaviour.   

Where a complainant is identified as displaying persistent or unreasonable behaviour an action plan will be developed for managing communication with the patient.  This may include such actions as:

• Removal from the practice list (for example where violence against a member of the practice team has occurred)
• The channelling all communications through a named individual
• Limiting what communications take place, by time, subject or communication method
• Informing the complainant that future correspondence will be read and placed on file but not responded to
• Asking the complainant to enter into an agreement about their conduct
• Consideration of reporting matters to the police or taking legal action if warranted.

Where an action plan is put in place the complainant should be informed unless it is deemed unsafe to do so.

Supporting Documents:

MPS (2009) NHS Complaints in England: Regulations and Principles London: MPS https://www.cddlmc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/MPS-NHS-Complaints-Guidance.pdf

NHS England (2021) NHS England Complaints Policyhttps://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/nhs-england-complaints-policy-amended.pdf

Department of Health (2021) The NHS Constitution for England http://www.nhs.uk/choiceintheNHS/Rightsandpledges/NHSConstitution/Pages/Overview.aspx