Making a Complaint

If you are not happy with any of the services provided by Lanarkshire Carers, please get in touch and let us know why so that we can try and improve things for you and other service users.

How do I make a complaint?

You can contact us in a number of ways to make a complaint:

• By telephone: Hamilton Centre (01698 428090) or Airdrie Centre (01236 755550)
• By email
• Via our website
• By post: Please write to Lanarkshire Carers, Ground Floor Left Princes Gate, 60 Castle Street, Hamilton, ML3 6BU
• In person: by visiting one of our centres or speaking to a member of staff at an outreach location

Who should I complain to?

Please try to pick up with a member of our staff in the first instance. If they are unable to assist you with your complaint or your complaint is regarding a member of staff, your complaint will be directed to one of the management team. If the complaint is about the Chief Executive Officer then the complaint should be directed to the Chairperson of Lanarkshire Carers.

Do I need to give you my name?

You do not need to give us your name or provide any contact details, but this could have an impact on how well we deal with your complaint. Providing us with your name and contact information will allow us to follow up with you if we require more information and to keep you updated on progress.

Please note that all complaints made to Lanarkshire Carers will be dealt with in the strictest of confidence.

What can I complain about?

Things you can complain about include:

• The quality of services provided by Lanarkshire Carers including the facilities you have accessed or have been prevented from accessing
• If you have been affected by something we have or haven’t done, either directly or indirectly

How long do I have to make a complaint?

The longer you leave it, the more difficult it may be to resolve your complaint, therefore we would encourage you to get in touch as soon as possible so it can be investigated fully and resolved quickly. This can also help reduce any potential impact on you, other service users or similar complaints being made to us.

What happens after I make a complaint?

We will try our best to resolve your complaint as soon as we receive it, however it may require further investigation for us to understand what went wrong and decide what the best course of action may be. We will contact you within 10 working days to discuss the matter further, providing you have given us your contact details.

Will I get a response?

If you have provided us with your contact details we will keep you updated as our investigation progresses, either verbally or in writing. We will advise you of the outcome, any action we have taken to resolve your complaint and what has been done to prevent it from happening again in future.

Can someone else make a complaint on my behalf?

You can ask someone else to make a complaint on your behalf, however the person making the complaint must have your permission to do so in order for us to investigate it further. We may need to contact you to confirm you are aware of the complaint and have given permission for the person to pursue this on your behalf, therefore we would ask you to provide contact details if it is appropriate to do so.

What if I change my mind after I’ve complained?

You can withdraw your complaint at any time during the investigation stage. Please get in touch with us directly and advise that you no longer want us to pursue the complaint.

Depending on the complaint made, we may decide to proceed with an investigation to ensure it does not impact any other service users in future, but we will not associate you personally with this investigation.

I’m not happy with the way my complaint has been dealt with or the outcome. What next?

The process and outcome of any complaint made to us will likely be as a result of an internal investigation along with guidance and support from third parties, therefore any outcome or decision made is usually final. If you are not satisfied that the complaint has been dealt with accordingly or you have been negatively impacted as a result of the complaint, you can appeal this in writing to the Chairperson and we will try to resolve this for you. We will contact you within one month to advise that we have received your appeal and how we plan to proceed.

If you are still not completely satisfied with the outcome after appealing, you can contact the Citizens Advice Bureau who may be able to advise you further.

Unreasonable use of our complaints process

Individuals have the right to complain to Lanarkshire Carers if they are not happy with the services we provide. They also have the right to appeal if they are not satisfied with the outcome. However, this contact becomes unreasonable when the effect of the repeated complaints is to harass, or to prevent the organisation from pursuing a legitimate aim or implementing a legitimate decision.

We consider access to a complaints system to be important and it will only be in exceptional circumstances that we would consider such repeated use unacceptable – but we reserve the right to do so in those exceptional cases. Lanarkshire Carers Unacceptable Actions policy sets out our approach to managing the relatively few service users whose actions or behaviours are considered to be unacceptable.  Click on the link below to view our policy in detail:

Unacceptable Actions Policy (PDF)