Compliments, Suggestions and Complaints

The Trust values and respects the views of everyone who has reason to use its services.  We want to know if anyone using our services feels unhappy about any aspect of their experience. We will learn from your experience and take action when things have gone wrong in order to prevent your experience happening in the future and knowing of your experience will help us to improve our services. You can be assured that making a complaint will not affect your current or future treatment.

To access a copy of the Trust's complaints procedure, please open at this link

Complaints can be received from:

• Current or past patients of the Trust.
• Representatives of patients (e.g. relatives, friends or carers) acting with their written consent.
• People acting on behalf of deceased patients - with the consent of the patient’s next of kin.

Timing of a Complaint:

• You should make your complaint as soon as possible after the event.
• Your complaint should be no later than 12 months after the event, or no later than 12 months after the date when you became aware of the problem.

How to Complain:

• When possible you should let the person delivering the service or their manager know that you are unhappy, so they can put things right at the time.
• We understand that you may not always feel comfortable doing this. You can instead speak to PALS (Patient Advice & Liaison Service). The PALS Team (contact details below) can help to sort out problems on your behalf.
• If PALS cannot solve your concerns within 24 hours or you are still unhappy you can contact Patient Services, who can investigate your concerns under the NHS Complaints Regulations (2009). You can make your complaint verbally, electronically or in writing.

When your complaint is received:

• A member of the Patient Services team (contact details below) will always try to contact you to discuss your concerns and advise on the best way to deal with them and how long this is likely to take.
• The process may encompass one or all of the following and we can arrange any of these or other possible solutions for you:
• a phone call from the manager in charge of the service can sort out your problems
• an apology
• a meeting to talk about your concerns
• a full investigation and a written response.
• We will keep you updated on what is happening and agree with you the best way to do this (phone/email/letter).
• We will try to make the process as easy as possible.
• We will also give you details of ICAS (Independent Complaints and Advocacy Service – contact details below). This is a free, confidential service, which is independent of the Trust. ICAS can help you make the complaint and support you throughout the process, including attending meetings with you.
• If you have particular problems or a disability we can find ways of providing you with the help and information you need.

Timescales of the complaint process:

• We will try to contact you within 3 working days of receiving your complaint. We will always try to telephone you but if we cannot reach you we will write to you and ask you to call us. We are happy to call you back.
• We will agree a reasonable timescale with you to give us enough time to respond to your complaint in the way we have agreed.
• If it looks as though we cannot get back to you by the date we agreed, we will contact you to explain why this is and let you know when we will be in touch again.

Contact and Communication with you:

• When we first get in touch with you we will agree how we will respond to your complaint. This may be by a phone call from another department, a meeting with senior staff or a letter following a formal investigation.
• We will keep you updated with progress, using the means agreed during our initial contact (phone, email or letter).

If you continue to be dissatisfied:

• Please inform us within 28 days of receiving the response letter if you feel that the concerns you raised have not been resolved to your satisfaction. If we do not hear from you within this time span we will consider your complaint to have been resolved satisfactorily.
• If you are unhappy with how your complaint has been handled we can agree some other ways of dealing with your concerns. For instance we can set up a meeting to talk about the things you are still unhappy about.
• We will always try to find ways to resolve your concerns within the Trust. However, if we have tried all reasonable means of resolving your concerns and you are still dissatisfied you can request a review by the Ombudsman (contact details below).

CONTACT DETAILS

• PALS - Tel: 0121 627 2747

Email: pals@bwhct.nhs.uk  Web: www.bwhct.nhs.uk

• Patient Services Department – Tel: 0121 607 4749

Email: complaints@bwhct.nhs.uk  Web: www.bwhct.nhs.uk

General Management, Birmingham Women’s NHS Foundation Trust

Edgbaston, Birmingham B152TG

• Parliamentary & Health Service Ombudsman: Tel - 0345 015 4033

Email: phso.enquiries@ombudsman.org.uk

Web: www.ombudsman.org.uk

• ICAS (Independent Complaints & Advocacy Service)

Tel: 0845 120 3748 Minicom: 0845 337 3067

Email: pohwericas@pohwericas.net

Web: www.pohwer.net

• NHS Constitution brings together a number of rights, pledges and responsibilities for staff and patients alike.

Web: http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Healthcare/NHSConstitution/index.htm

This page was last modified on Thu Feb 17 2011