The Chief Officer – Finance, Performance and Change presented a report which updated the Committee on the work being undertaken to review the Authority’s Concerns and Complaints process.

She advised that following the Committee receiving a report on the above, feedback from the Committee suggested they would like the Authority to take a more holistic view of complaints and explore whether there were digital options for complaints management.

The Committee established a working group, which consisted of Cllr Lyn Walters, Cllr Cheryl Green and Cllr Amanda Williams. The working group undertook research and spoke to other local authorities.

She advised that on 26 January 2022, the elected member working group met the Chief Officer - Legal, and Regulatory Services, HR and Corporate Policy to feed back their findings and views. These findings were then presented shortly after to the Corporate Management Board and it was agreed there to refer the matter to the Digital Transformation Board for further consideration.

She added that prior to presentation to the Digital Transformation Board, initial work has been undertaken to explore the opportunities of incorporating the current formal stage of concerns and complaints within the existing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system which is used in Customer Services for recording all informal concerns and complaints. Work was now underway to look at developing the system so that all concerns and complaints are held and processed within the CRM system, rather than recorded in a standalone Excel spreadsheet with the aim of improving currenting reporting across the whole organisation. A copy of the complaints performance report that is provided each quarter to the Complaints Standards Authority Wales is also being reviewed to ensure the right data can be captured within the CRM system to simplify and improve the current reporting process.

A Member mentioned as part of the working group they wanted to look at compliments as well as these played a key part in the customer experience. Some areas that may have higher numbers of complaints than others may also have higher numbers of compliments to the service and so logging these would give a fuller picture. The Chief Officer – Finance, Performance and Change agreed that it was an important aspect of the process and would be included in this piece of work.

A Member asked if the system included complaints that went to schools. It was highlighted that this was not the case as complaints to schools were monitored separately from those received by the Local Authority.

The Lay Member asked if we were compliant with the legislation on this and also what other Councils were doing with regards to recording complaints to schools. The Chairperson stated that she had spoken with the Corporate Director Education and Family Support this morning and he had confirmed that the guidance from Welsh Government was that Schools were to deal with the complaints themselves.

Members discussed the complaints procedure for schools and asked that an update be provided at the next committee meeting on how school complaints were recorded and ensuring they were recorded effectively.

RESOLVED: That the Committee noted the contents of the report.