Service requests and complaints

‘Effective complaint handling enables individuals to be heard and understood. The starting point for this is a shared understanding of what constitutes a service request and what constitutes a complaint. In most cases organisations should be able to put things right through normal service delivery processes.’ (Paragraph 1.1 of the Complaint Handling Code)

Strong links between services and complaints functions are key to good complaint management. This is supported by ensuring complaints procedures set out clear definitions of ‘service requests’ and ‘complaints’.

Organisations are strongly encouraged to adopt the definitions set out in the Code. This means members of the public will experience a consistent approach to service delivery and complaint handling. It also supports consistent recording of data, allowing organisations to benchmark performance against similar bodies.

Organisations should ensure that officers and staff in customer facing roles understand the difference between a service request and a complaint. This can be achieved through ensuring these definitions are adopted and included across other policies and procedures as well as internal training material. This may not be limited to training on complaint handling and may include any training relating to customer service delivery.

The key question to ask when deciding whether to deal with an issue raised by an individual as a service request or a complaint is whether the service area subject to the complaint has had a reasonable opportunity to put things right. If the individual has not raised concerns about the actions or decisions of the service before, the service should have an opportunity to put things right through routine service delivery. If the individual has raised or attempted to raise the same or very similar issues with the service area and remains unhappy with the response, the matter should be dealt with as a complaint. Organisations may consider producing service specific examples to support staff to process any issue raised through the correct channels.

Where a service decides that a service request it received should be handled as a complaint instead, the timescales for responding to the complaint may run from the date the organisation identified the complaint, rather than the date the initial service request was received. Organisations should ensure service requests are processed in a timely manner to avoid unnecessary delays.

Organisations should include clear information in published material and online to help members of the public understand how best to raise concerns. This should prevent instances of complaints being raised as service requests and vice versa. There is some suggested wording below which could be used on webpages and in online and paper complaint forms.