Contact: Irene Unwin ext: 7256.

1 Introduction

1.1 It is a requirement of both the Children Act (1989) and the National Health Service and Community Care Act (1990) that the social services department produce an annual report of the operation of the complaints procedure and present to the relevant committee.

1.2 This report focuses specifically on the operation of the complaints procedure, and unlike previous years does not consider the wider functioning of the complaints and customer care service. This is to ensure that the report is produced to conform to the need for all departmental annual complaints reports to be completed prior to the County Council Standards Committee meeting in August.

2 Recommendations:

2.1 That committee accepts this report.

2.2 That committee requests an additional report to be produced for a future meeting containing a more detailed analysis of the operation of the Complaints and Customer Care Service.

3 Annual Report of the Operation of the Complaints Procedure

3.1 In the year from April 2003 to March 2004 there were 539 enquiries received at headquarters, this compares to 476 received for the same period the previous year and is an increase of 13.2%. (See Table 1 below) Of those received over the year 507 were complaints, or expressions of dissatisfaction with the service received, an increase of 18.5% from the 428 complaints received at headquarters the previous year.

3.2 These complaints need to be seen in the context of the volume of work carried out by the department. Of the 539 enquiries related to Children and Families. The department has over 3,300 `open case' relating to Children and Families at any one time, which includes approximately 400 children on the Child Protection Register and over 1,000 children looked after. In services for adults and older people nearly 53,000 assessments were carried out in the year 2003-4, therefore the 301 enquiries relating to these client sectors suggests a very low level of dissatisfaction.

3.3 Table 2 (above) shows the number of complaints relating to each client group. There was a 23% increase in complaints relating to Children and Families, with no obvious trend regarding the type of complaint. The increase in complaints relating to Older People of 19%, a proportion of which may be attributable to complaints relating to the changes in domiciliary care charges. The decrease in the number of complaints from the Mental Health Sector is almost certainly attributable to Health and Social Service Partnership which came into effect in April 2003.

3.4 The changes in the relationship between the person making the complaint and the service user are given in Table 3, above. There has been a continued increase in the number of self-referrals, with children and families increasing from 33 last year to 39 this year and learning disability increasing from 6 to 13. Caution has to be taken in considering the self-referral figures for Children and Families as a number of complaints were made by adults about the time when they were involved with the department and should not be interpreted as all relating to complaints from current service users.

3.5 There were 3 complaints that could not be resolved informally and for which formal investigations were held. (See Table 4 below) This is a reduction of 5 from the previous year's total of 8. . Therefore 99.4% of complaints were resolved informally. This is the smallest number of formal complaints since the procedures were introduced in 1990 and is a direct result of the efforts made across the department to resolve complaints quickly and the use of conciliation.

3.6 The complaint from the Older Person's client group was the only complaint taken to a formal Review Panel in the year. The Review Panel upheld the complaint, as the department could not evidence that the placement could have been made in a home that accepted the Hampshire rate.

3.7 There were no racial incidents recorded.

3.8 91.6% of complaints have been acknowledged within 5 working days. A small number of complaints can not be acknowledged as the source is unknown. Of the remainder either a full response has been made within ten days or the complaint has been received in the department on a certain date but has not been forwarded to the complaints office for several days.

3.9 66% of complaints have received a full response within 28 days. If a full response is not possible within this timescale, because of the complexity of the complaint or the absence of key staff, an interim response will be sent.

3.10 This report has shown that the volume of complaints has increased over the last year. This should not be interpreted as an indication of a deterioration in the quality of service offered and the increase in complaints from service users, rather than their representatives, suggests that service users are increasingly more able to express their concerns.

3.11 The continued reduction in formal complaints is to be welcomed as this indicates that raising concerns are satisfied with the outcome of informal intervention and do not wish to pursue their complaint further.

Section 100 D - Local Government Act 1972 - Background Documents

The Following documents disclose facts or matters on which this report, or an important part of it, is based and has been relied upon to a material extent in the preparation of this report.

None

NB the list excludes:

1. Published works

2. Documents which disclose exempt of confidential information as defined in the Act.