Complaints Policy
Code of practice for handling patient complaints
We want our service to meet your expectations. If you have a concern or complaint about any aspect of our service, we want to know what mistakes we made and identify how we can improve to ensure that we meet your expectations in future. Our aim is to learn from any feedback we receive and improve the service we provide to our patients.
We will deal with complaints courteously and promptly and aim to resolve the matter as quickly as possible.
Making a complaint
If you wish to make a complaint or simply let us know how we could have done better, please contact Raquel Sousa, our Complaints Manager:
- By telephone on 01293 56 57 65
- By e-mail at pembroke@pembrokedental.co.uk
- By letter to Raquel Sousa, 83 Tomlin Court, Commonwealth Drive, Crawley, RH10 1AH
- The Complaints’ Manager will endeavour to be available to discuss your complaint at a mutually convenient time. Please contact the practice to arrange an appointment, telephone call, or meeting.
If you contact the practice to make a complaint and the Complaints’ Manager is not available, we will arrange a convenient time for them to contact you. We will ask you for brief details of your complaint so that the Complaints’ Manager can gather any useful information before contacting you. You will be given a copy of the notes made for the Complaints Manager.
If the matter requires a more immediate response, we will arrange for a senior member of the dental team to deal with it.
If your complaint is about your dental treatment or the fee charged, we will usually ask the dentist concerned to contact you, unless you do not want this.
We acknowledge all complaints in writing and enclose a copy of this code of practice as soon as possible, normally within three working days.
Confidentiality
All complaints will be handled sensitively and in strict confidence. Information relating to a complaint will only be shared with those who need to know in order to investigate and resolve the matter. Complaint records are kept separately from clinical records and are managed in accordance with applicable data protection legislation.
Making a complaint will not adversely affect your future care or treatment at the practice. We welcome feedback and view complaints as an opportunity to improve the quality of the services we provide.
Investigating a complaint
We will offer to discuss the complaint with you and will ask how you would like to be kept informed of developments – by telephone, letters or e-mail or by face-to-face meetings. We will let you know how we will deal with your complaint and the likely time that the investigation will take to complete. If you do not wish to discuss the complaint further, we will still let you know the expected timescale for completing the investigation.
We will investigate your complaint promptly and aim to provide a response within 10 working days. If our investigation requires more time, we will keep you informed of the progress of our investigation and provide an estimated timeframe for completion.
When we have completed our investigation, we will provide you with a full written report, unless you have told us that you do not wish for further communication. The report will explain how we considered the complaint, the conclusions we reached for each part of your complaint, details of any remedial action we have taken and whether further action is needed.
Records
We keep proper and comprehensive records of any complaints that we receive and the action we have taken following investigation. These records are reviewed regularly to identify trends, recognise opportunities for improvement and help ensure that lessons are learned from complaints.
If you are not satisfied
For complaints about NHS treatment:
ENGLAND:
The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, Millbank Tower, Millbank London SW1P 4QP
(0345 015 4033 or www.ombudsman.org.uk).
For complaints about private treatment:
Dental Complaints Service, 37 Wimpole Street, London W1G 8DQ
(020 8253 0800 or online at contactus.gdc-uk.org/dcs/Complaint/PrivatePatients).
For data complaints:
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) online reporting tool: www.ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint