4. New complaints received outside the Intake process

New complaints and resubmissions may arrive in the Assessment and Investigation Teams. Below is a list of possible scenarios. If the Assessment or Investigation teams receive:

• A call direct to an Investigator because they had previously investigated a separate complaint.

The Investigator will ask the caller to visit our website or contact Intake directly on 0300 061 0614. 

• An email or Online Complaint Service (OCS)  message direct to an Investigator because they had previously investigated another complaint.

This will be responded to by asking the caller to visit our website or contact Intake directly on 0300 061 0614. Investigators can use the template on ECHO called ‘EML – re new complaint’ for this. Please send this directly to the complainant. Do not forward the ‘new complaint’ correspondence from the complainant to Intake. If the complainant contacts Intake we can get all the relevant information and it stops the complainant contacting Investigators about the previous complaint.

• During the course of an investigation, new postal correspondence is received that is considered to be a new complaint.

Add a note to Notes & Analysis confirming there is a new complaint. A task will be set on the current record for both the Intake Team Leaders (ITLs) with an explanation of what is required, including identification of any documentation relating to the new complaint. The ITLs will either deal with the complaint or delegate accordingly.

• A new complaint that the Investigator identifies needs to be raised and immediately allocated. 

The Investigation Team Coordinator will create the new case and arrange for allocation. We must make sure we have the correct BinJ recorded on the case before contacting them to avoid the risk of disclosing personal information to the wrong organisation and causing a data incident.

• A possible joint working case.

The case will need to go through the ‘initial look task’ process. Please see the LGSCO/PHSO Joint Working Manual. 

• Cases where a remedy has not been complied with.

The Compliance Manual says where a BinJ fails to provide an agreed remedy, a Casework Manager will generally open a new case to consider the failure. The new investigation may also consider substantive issues where appropriate. The complaint does not need to be considered by the Intake or Assessment teams, and should be opened by a Team Coordinator and allocated directly within an investigation team. If a casework manager considers they should record an outcome of ‘remedy not complete and not satisfied’ but not open a new complaint (or take other positive action), this must be agreed by the Director of Investigation.

Team Coordinators will discuss anything out of the ordinary with the ITLs or the Customer Service Manager. 

Any ad-hoc contacts should also be referred to Intake.