Agenda item

To receive a report from the Head of Housing & Health providing the annual Complaints Handling Report. Increased tenant satisfaction is at the heart of major changes to the regulatory landscape for social housing that have been implemented by the Government. Central to this change is an enhanced complaints handling approach required of social housing providers by the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH).

The Group had before it, and NOTED, a report and appendices * from the Head of Housing & Health providing annual information in relation to the handling of complaints by Mid Devon Housing.

The following was highlighted within the report:

·         This was necessarily a large report since the Ombudsman required the Council to demonstrate that Members had seen it and to meet the statutory Complaints Handling Code. The report provided a window into what the Council was getting right and what it was getting wrong.

·         The report demonstrated that the Council was handling complaints well, in a timely fashion and that the numbers of complaints had dipped slightly. The service proactively encouraged complaints and when received worked hard to identify common themes and areas.

·         Most complaints related to repairs as was to be expected given the volume of service requests. Officers held a monthly complaints and performance meetings and sought to capture lesson’s learned to improve the service where it could.

Discussion took place regarding:

·         It was confirmed that every single complaint was logged, however, if for example a complaint was made that a repair had not been undertaken but that every effort had been made by officers to visit the property at an agreed time but had been refused entry, then that part of the complaint would not be upheld.

·         Equality Impact Assessments could be tightened up and more thoroughly considered prior to policies affecting tenants being written rather than being considered at a later stage in the process.

·         Lessons Learned - this list did not include common lessons learned such as improving communications, compliance with policy and procedure or staff/contractor relations, the question was asked as to why not? It was confirmed that whilst not listed, these factors were always considered.

·         All complaints opened were shown as closed within the report, did this mean none were carried over as it suggested there were no problems? It was explained that some complaints were not an issue for the Council to deal with but were referred to the Ombudsman and in general the Council did not have long term outstanding complaints, all matters having been dealt with wherever possible.

Note: * Report and appendices previously circulated.