Our complaints process gives our customers a simple and easy way to raise and escalate any complaints
Thomas Scotting, our Customer Feedback Advisor, talks through our complaints process and why he enjoys his role at CHP.
In my role as Customer Feedback Advisor, one of the things I’m responsible for is investigating and responding to any formal complaints we receive.
Our complaints process is a two-stage procedure which I manage impartially, working closely with a number of teams across the business. This process has been designed to give our customers a simple and easy way to raise and escalate any complaints.
If we receive a complaint, it’s my responsibility to look into it and to find a resolution. I also work with colleagues to check whether the level of service we’ve offered is to our expected standards. All replies to customers’ complaints come from me. This means if you do make a complaint you only have to deal with one person, and you will have the same point of contact throughout the process.
Once I’ve completed my investigations into your complaint and a decision has been made, I send out what’s known as a stage one response. However, this isn’t the final response, as if you’re not satisfied you can ask for your complaint to be heard by an internal appeal panel. This will be chaired by a Director or Head of Service who works outside the area of your complaint and will look at whether the decision should be changed.
There’s also another stage after that, if you want it. If you’ve gone through our complaints process and are still unhappy with the outcome you can contact the Housing Ombudsman. They will either try and find an early resolution, or they’ll conduct a formal investigation which involves gathering information from you and from us. The Housing Ombudsman is also available at any point in the process if you want to contact them for support or advice.
You may think that managing complaints can be a difficult and unrewarding job but, for me, it’s quite the opposite. I feel fortunate to work directly with our customers every day. This gives me an opportunity to understand first-hand how you feel about the services we provide and to see what I can do to help improve them. This is a particularly enjoyable aspect of my job, as I take great pride in being able to learn from the feedback you provide and use it to help the organisation provide a better service.
One of the great things about working at CHP is that it’s an organisation that welcomes and encourages all feedback, whether positive or negative. All comments allow us to learn. Whether they come from a survey response, our formal complaints process, or filling out our online feedback form we look at everything everyone tells us and take action wherever possible.
I know it can take a long time to build positive relationships with customers, but I am committed to achieving this in my role. I also want to do all I can to turn what might have been a negative experience into a positive one, along with keeping the good relationships we already have.
Everyone at CHP works hard every single day to delight our customers and using your feedback is I think one of the best ways to achieve this. That’s why I think I have a great job - knowing I’m listening to you and doing my bit to make our processes better. It fills me with a huge sense of achievement.
If you want to send your feedback, good or bad, I look forward to hearing from you. Please use visit our Your feedback page.