21. Complaints procedure stage 1
The complaint will be acknowledged within 5 working days and we will explain who is dealing with the complaint and our timescales for responding.
The complaint will be investigated by an appropriate officer, usually the Assistant Director or Manager for the service, with input from other officers as required. A response will be prepared and sent to the complainant within 20 working days of acknowledgement where this is practical but where this is not possible due to the complexity of the matter to which the complaint relates or other exceptional or unforeseen circumstances, we will make this known to the complainant and provide an indicative timescale when a full response will be provided.
The stage 1 response will include information about what the complainant should do if they are not satisfied with the handling of their complaint. A complainant will have a period of one month in which to request an escalation of their complaint to stage 2. If we have not received this request within one month, the complaint will be considered to be resolved.