Complaints, Compliments, Comments

Fylde Council believes in listening, taking account of and responding to your views. Our staff are committed to providing excellent standards of customer care at all times.

Your views are important to us

You may have a concern, a complaint or a compliment about a council service or you may just have a comment to make which you can do by completing the form below.

Where there is an appeal procedure for actions taken, such as planning decisions or licensing applications, please make sure you follow the relevant appeal procedure.

Comments and compliments

We will pass comments and compliments on to the relevant service within three working days of receipt and we will consider feedback in an open-minded and impartial way and will use it to help improve our services.

Report it

If you are reporting an issue or submitting a request a service for the first time, this should not be logged as a complaint. You can report an issue here.

Complaints

The Council has a complaints process and a definition of the areas that would constitute a complaint are outlined below:

When the Council fails to do something that we promised to do
When the Council has done something badly or wrong
When you feel you have been treated unfairly or impolitely
When the Council fails to respond properly to a service request or report

In the first instance we will acknowledge it and act upon your complaint and make sure that you get a full response.

The council will aim to provide a response to the complainant within five working days.

If the complaint is going to take longer than this to complete, the complainant will be informed of an anticipated date for response.

The complaint procedure has two stages:

Stage One – The responsible service area will deal with your complaint based on the form submission.

Stage Two – Your complaint can be escalated if you do not receive a response, or if you are not satisfied with the response you are given. The complaint will be referred to an appropriate Head of Service who will investigate the matter and provide a response within five working days of the Stage two request.

A response at any stage in the complaints process MUST be one of the following within the five working day target time:

A clear resolution of the complaint made with a response provided to the person who made the complaint and anyone else representing them i.e. an elected member
A holding response that states clearly WHO is dealing with the complaint, their name (not just post) and contact details, WHY there is a delay in providing a full response / resolution within the five day target and WHEN they will get the full response

Failure to provide a response within the five working day target is grounds for escalating the complaint at any stage of the process.

Complaints to external bodies

The two stages mentioned above form the procedure for dealing with complaints internally. You are, however, entitled to refer your concerns to external bodies if you are unhappy with the way we have dealt with your complaints or if you feel that the outcome is unsatisfactory. You can speak to:

Local Councillors – you can at any time, refer a complaint to your local councillor, who can take up the complaint on your behalf. However, it must be remembered that everyone, including councillors, will be treated fairly and equally through the internal process.

Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman – the local government ombudsman will want to be sure that you have already been through our internal complaint procedure and that the Council has had an opportunity to address your concerns. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman can also be contacted regarding matters of personal injustice. The Local Government Ombudsman can be contacted at:

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman PO Box 4771 Coventry CV4 0EH Online at http://www.lgo.org.uk

LGO Advice Team / 0300 061 0614 or 0845 602 1983 (Monday to Friday from 8.30am to 5.00pm)

For advice on making a complaint, or to make a complaint over the telephone, please call the LGO Advice Team on 0300 061 0614 or 0845 602 1983. (Calls to 03 numbers will cost no more than calls to national geographic numbers (starting 01or 02) from both mobiles and landlines, and will be included as part of any inclusive call minutes or discount schemes in the same way as geographic calls. Please note that calls may be recorded for training and quality purposes.) The Advice Team are available Monday to Friday from 8.30am to 5.00pm. You can also text ‘call back’ to 0762 480 4299.

Complaints – Members of the Council (Elected or Co-opted)

All members of the council – whether elected or co-opted – must abide by the council’s Code of Conduct which governs their behaviour and actions when they carry out their duties as local authority members.

If you wish to make a complaint about a council member breaching the Code of Conduct please send this in writing to the council’s monitoring officer. The monitoring officer will aim to provide an acknowledgement to the complainant within 5 working days. This response may indicate further timescales depending on the nature of the allegation.

Your complaint should set out:

The name of the council member
Date and detail of the incident
Your name and contact details

Please send the complaint about a council member to the Monitoring Officer: tracy.manning@fylde.gov.uk

Complaints

The council will aim to provide a response to the complainant within 5 working days.

If the complaint is going to take longer than this to complete, the complainant will be informed of an anticipated date for response.

Comments and compliments

We will pass comments and compliments on to the relevant service within 3 working days of receipt and we will consider feedback in an open-minded and impartial way and we will use it to help improve our services.

Report it

If you are reporting an issue or submitting a request a service for the first time, this should not be logged as a complaint. You can report an issue here.

Complaints

The Council does have a complaints process and a definition of the areas that would constitute a complaint that is outlined below:

When the Council fails to do something that we promised to do
When the Council has done something badly or wrong
When you feel you have been treated unfairly or impolitely
When the Council fails to respond properly to a service request or report

In the first instance we will acknowledge it and act upon your complaint and make sure that you get a full response.

The council will aim to provide a response to the complainant within 5 working days.

If the complaint is going to take longer than this to complete, the complainant will be informed of an anticipated date for response.

The complaint procedure has two stages:

Stage One – the responsible service area will deal with your complaint based on the form submission.

Stage Two – Your complaint can be escalated if you do not receive a response, or you are not satisfied with the response you are given. The complaint will be referred to an appropriate Head of service who will investigate the matter and provide a response within five working days of the Stage 2 request.

A response at any stage in the complaints process MUST be one of the following within the five working day target time:

A clear resolution of the complaint made with a response provided to the person who made the complaint and anyone else representing them i.e. an elected member.

A holding response that states clearly WHO is dealing with the complaint, their name (not just post) and contact details, WHY there is a delay in providing a full response / resolution within the five day target and WHEN they will get the full response Failure to provide a response within the five working day target is grounds for escalating the complaint at any stage of the process.