5. Inputs from Assessment 

Cases passed through to Investigation will have at least a brief entry on ECHO in Notes & Analysis, which explains: 

• why they have decided the case needs to be investigated
• any urgency 
• any consent issues
• any discretionary decisions which they have made (including if, exceptionally, prematurity has not been checked), and
• whether an initial phone call has been made and, if so, any issues arising (including reasonable adjustments).

If there are delays in allocating cases in Investigation which mean the 20-day allocation standard will be missed, we must send KIT letters to complainants. KIT letters should be sent to complainants every six weeks after the initial keeping in touch task set by Assessment. 

We must notify the complainant and BinJ when complaints are allocated in Investigation using the standard letter in ECHO.

Once Assessment decides a complaint should be investigated, the expectation is that this should happen. A decision not to investigate should only be made in Investigation if the complaint has been passed through in error from Assessment, and must be agreed by an Assistant Ombudsman. In all other cases, including those where new information becomes available that changes our view, Investigation should decide the complaint, whether by completing or ending the investigation. There is further information about this in the section on ending investigations (including withdrawn complaints) and decisions and decision reasons. 

Investigators in the Investigation Unit are not bound by decisions made in Assessment about what they should investigate – they can make their own decisions but should set out their rationale for reaching a different decision in Notes & Analysis. Jurisdiction has to be kept under review at all stages of our consideration of a complaint. Once a case has passed from Assessment to Investigation, jurisdictional decisions should only be changed upon receipt of new and relevant information, or if they are clearly wrong. The rationale for changing a jurisdictional decision should be set out in Notes & Analysis. 

Assessment may also have invited the BinJ to offer a remedy during its involvement in the case. Where that happens but the case is later forwarded to Investigation, any previous invitations to agree a remedy made by Assessment are no longer valid. Investigation should progress the investigation on its own merits and only once sufficient investigation has taken place should any further remedy recommendations be formally set out in a draft decision.

Where a complaint is from a number of complainants who may require different remedies for any injustice caused, or who claim different injustices, we will need to consider splitting the complaint and providing different complaint numbers. This issue should be considered on a case by case basis and any decision to split up the complaint should be referred to an Assistant Ombudsman. 

Although we have three stages in our process (Intake -> Assessment -> Investigation) they all form part of our overall consideration of the complaint and each stage feeds into the next.  Evidence gathered at any stage of the process forms part of the ongoing consideration of the complaint. We must disclose anything material to the decision to both parties, subject to GDPR and other data protection/information laws. We must also notify the BinJ if we change the scope of the complaint during our consideration of it, including if we split up the complaint. Changing the scope of a complaint during an investigation should be a rarity. 

The complaint category and subcategory should have been completed, but Investigators should check that these are correct as further information becomes available. Additional sub-categories should be added if necessary.

Cases closed in Assessment and then reopened on review will be received in Investigation as a normal complaint, rather than as a post decision review.