Moray Women’s Aid Complaints Policy
1. Policy Statement
Moray Women’s Aid delivers services to women, children and young people who are experiencing domestic abuse.
Moray Women’s Aid aims to provide a high-quality standard of service. If we fail to do this, it is important that we know about it.
This policy and the separate procedure will provide an effective and transparent way of dealing with complaints. It recognises that the most successful organisations are those that have moved towards a culture that perceives complaints as an opportunity to improve quality of services.
Moray Women’s Aid will demonstrate both fairness and openness in the way it deals with complaints and show that it is prepared to listen to its stakeholders.
2. Policy Aims
A complaint may be defined as, “an expression of dissatisfaction about the standard or quality of service, action or lack of action by Moray Women’s Aid or its staff, affecting an individual or a group of individuals who receive a service provided by Moray Women’s Aid.”
Moray Women’s Aid aims to investigate and address all complaints in order to continually improve the quality of our service.
Moray Women’s Aid aims to:
- take complaints seriously and offering those who complain a clear response to their complaint within defined time limits;
- improve services by providing an opportunity to amend, reflect on and improve the services provided by Moray Women’s Aid;
- ensure that the Moray Women’s Aid Complaints Procedure will be easily understood and straightforward to use, and will accept either spoken or written complaints;
- ensure that the Moray Women’s Aid Complaints Procedure will be well-managed, fair and objective, aimed at resolving problems as quickly as possible and in a manner, which respects confidentiality and privacy.
3. Responsibilities
3.1 Employer’s Responsibilities
Moray Women’s Aid is responsible for:
- ensuring that all employees are aware of and adhere to this policy and complaints procedure;
- providing clear and accessible information to service users on the complaints policy and procedure;
- providing easily available information on how service users can make a complaint to the Care inspectorate;
- ensuring that employees access the appropriate level of training to support the implementation of this policy and procedure;
- managing complaints within the agreed procedures and timescales;
- recording complaints and actions taken;
- monitoring and reviewing complaints so that the organisation can improve practice.
- Employees’ Responsibilities
All employees are responsible for:
- ensuring that they understand and comply with this policy and procedure;
- learning from complaints which have arisen and striving to improve delivery of the service;
- Using other policies and procedures to make internal complaint, which cannot be addressed informally. See 4.1 for further information.
4. Complaints in practice
4.1 Difference between complaints and whistleblowing
| 4.1.1 | Complaint
The individual reporting the issue is personally affected by the matter of concern, and it is in respect to receiving poor treatment within Moray Women’s Aid. There is a vested interest in the matter of concern. |
| 4.1.2 | Whistleblowing
The individual reporting the issue is not personally affected by the matter of concern, but rather holds concern for its impact on others in the workplace or beyond, as a matter of public interest. There is no vested interest in the matter of concern, or the concern reaches beyond the individual’s own vested interest. When the matter of concern is not limited to an individual’s own personal experience and in the public interest needs to be handled in a different way, stakeholders should use the provisions of the Whistleblowing Procedure when appropriate. See Appendix 8.3 for further information. Examples may be:
(this list is not exhaustive) |
4.4 Complaints procedure
The accompanying Complaints Procedure outlines how Moray Women’s Aid will conduct the practice of handling complaints.
4.5 Equality and Diversity
Moray Women’s Aid Equality and Diversity Policy sets out Moray Women’s Aid commitment to prevent unequal treatment and discrimination.
Moray Women’s Aid values the diversity of its workers and the contribution that each worker makes to the organisation and will work to ensure that discrimination does not take place when implementing its Complaints Policy and Procedure.
5. Breach of policy
5.1 Service Delivery
This Complaints Policy and Procedure offers the framework for dealing with problems arising in service delivery. Where there are concerns about a breach of this policy or in cases where it is in the public interest, service users may also refer to the Moray Women’s Aid Whistleblowing Policy and Procedure.
5.2 Employment
Moray Women’s Aid employees who feel that this policy has been breached should raise this in the first instance with their Manager. If an employee does not feel the issue has been dealt with to their satisfaction it can be dealt with formally under Moray Women’s Aid Grievance Procedure.
6. Training and Information
All workers of Moray Women's Aid will receive a copy of the Complaints Policy and Procedure and their role in implementing the policy will be fully explained. Moray Women's Aid, in the implementation of this policy, will identify any training requirements for workers.
Moray Women's Aid Complaints Policy and Procedures will form part of the induction programme for all new workers.
7. Monitoring and Review
Moray Women's Aid recognises that genuine resolution of complaints can only be achieved by monitoring and assessing the use of this policy and procedure and then using this information to modify and improve our future action plans and provisions.
Moray Women's Aid will monitor complaints against specific targets set within the Moray Women's Aid Complaints Action Plan.
Moray Women's Aid will monitor and review this policy every three years and/or when there are relevant changes in legislation or circumstances.
8. Appendices
8.1 Legislative and Regulatory Framework
Moray Women's Aid aims to comply with all legislation and codes of practice related to the handling of complaints.
Related legislation and codes of practice |
|
| SSSC Codes of Practice | SSSC Codes of Practice |
National Care Standards for Early Education & Childcare
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http://www.nationalcarestandards.org/files/early-education.pdf |
National Care Standards for Housing Support Services
|
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/349567/0116840.pdf |
Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010
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http://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2010/8/introduction |
8.2 Related internal policies and procedures
- Disciplinary
- Grievance
- Whistleblowing
8.3 Definition of whistleblowing: further information
The following excerpt is from Public Concern at Work: Frequently Asked Questions
www.pcaw.org.uk
What is the difference between making a complaint and blowing the whistle?
When someone blows the whistle, they are raising a concern about danger or illegality that affects others (e.g. customers, members of the public, or their employer). The person blowing the whistle is usually not directly, personally affected by the danger or illegality. Consequently, the whistleblower rarely has a personal interest in the outcome of any investigation into their concern - they are simply trying to alert others. For this reason, the whistleblower should not be expected to prove the malpractice. He or she is a messenger raising a concern so that others can address it.
This is very different from a complaint. When someone complains, they are saying that they have personally been poorly treated. This poor treatment could involve a breach of their individual employment rights or bullying, and the complainant is seeking redress or justice for themselves. The person making the complaint therefore has a vested interest in the outcome of the complaint and, for this reason, is expected to be able to prove their case.
Coming soon!