How balanced, transparent and apologetic are your Practice’s complaint response letters? Would the Parliamentary & Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) approve of your approach? Have you been criticised previously by the PHSO for the tone of your letters? Complaints handling is becoming an increasing issue for the NHS and the Ombudsman is receiving more and more…

In today’s internet age, customer reviews are everywhere. Book a holiday and you’ll find yourself scouting through traveller feedback on Trip Advisor. Head to download some music and you’ll be presented with a raft of user reviews. Go online to do some Christmas shopping and you’ll no doubt come across some kind of star rating…

For a Practice Manager handling complaints can be a difficult challenge. No one likes to receive a complaint but complaints need to be dealt with professionally, promptly and properly. But as a Practice Manager you may not be in total control of the investigation! You may be faced with a difficult patient and find that…

The Citizen’s Charter Complaints Task Force defines a complaint as an “expression of dissatisfaction requiring a response,” and sadly, complaints within a practice are inevitable from time to time. The CQC claimed in December last year that “there is much positive practice at all stages in the process of making a complaint”, but patients’ experiences with…

It has been reported this week that NHS England is considering allowing CCGs to handle patient complaints about GPs, following criticism of the current system by a parliamentary committee. The House of Commons Health Committee highlighted examples of primary care complaints from Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly being passed to a call centre…

The number of complaints being received by the GMC is on a steep rise, and it’s thought that social media culture is partly to blame. ‘Fitness to practice’ enquiries, for example, doubled from just over 5,000 in 2007 to over 10,000 in 2012, and other enquiries nearly doubled in the same period, from 3,615 to…