Issue - meetings

Officers had provided the Committee with an update on the performance on handling corporate complaints in quarter 3, covering the period October to December 2016.

The Council had received 383 Stage 1 complaints in the quarter with 97% of them being responded to within 15 days. Additionally the Council had received 77 requests for escalation to Stage 2, 71 of these had been dealt with within 20 days.

The results of the audit of cases in quarter 3 had been reported. In some instances where a service had received a relatively small number of complaint, a higher percentage of cases had been audited. Although the data indicated that Communications had only closed 1 out of three complaints within 15 days officers had explained that when they had checked the data the issue was a failure to close cases on the CRM system rather than a failure to close the complaint.

Officers had provided additional details regarding the Adults Social Care case where the Ombudsman had found maladministration, but no injustice. The Committee asked if they could be advised of how many homes the company who were responsible ran in the borough.

The Committee had also questioned the relatively small number of complaints made regarding Leisure Centres and Sports. Officers had explained that the majority of sports and leisure services were provided by an external contractor who would have their own complaints procedure and most complainants would no doubt approach them direct.

The Committee had asked what steps were taken to ensure lessons were learnt from completed complaints. Officers had advised that some areas i.e. housing, planning and environment were very good at applying lessons learnt to the way they dealt with issues to ensure they did not reoccur.

The Committee noted the report.