Suggestions, Comments and Complaints
Our aim is to provide the highest level of care for all our patients. We will always be willing to hear if there is any way that you think that we can improve the service we provide.
If you would like to give us any feedback or wish to make a complaint, please complete our Feedback and Complaints Triage.
How to Complain
We hope that most problems can be sorted out easily and quickly, often at the time they arise and with the person concerned. If your problem cannot be sorted out in this way and you wish to make a complaint, we would like you to let us know as soon as possible or at the most within a few weeks – this will enable us to establish what happened more easily.
If it is not possible to do that please let us have the details of your complaint:
- Within 12 months of the incident that caused the problem
- Within 12 months of discovering that you have a problem, provided this is within 12 months of the incident
Most complaints can be resolved at a local level. Please speak to a member of staff if you have a complaint; our staff are trained to handle complaints. Alternatively ask to speak to the Practice Manager.
We hope that if you have a problem, you will use our complaints procedure. We believe this will give us the best chance of putting right whatever has gone wrong and an opportunity to improve our practice.
Taking Your Complaint Further
If you want to make a complaint about primary care services to the commissioner, you will now contact the Black Country Integrated Care Board instead of NHS England.
You can do this by:
Telephone: 0300 0120 281
Email: [email protected]
Writing to us at: Time2Talk, NHS Black Country Integrated Care Board (ICB) Civic Centre, St Peter’s Square, Wolverhampton, WV1 1SH
Who can Complain?
- The patient
- Anyone with the patient’s written consent
- Anyone on behalf of someone too ill or too old to complain for themselves
- Where the patient is a child, by either parent or in the absence of both parents, the guardian or other adult who has care of the child
- Normally the next of kin where the patient has died
Complaining on Behalf of Someone Else
Please note that we keep strictly to the rules of medical confidentiality. If you are complaining on behalf of someone else we have to know that you have his or her permission to do so. You can do this by completing a third party patient complaint form. This form is available from reception or here
What shall we do
We shall acknowledge your complaint within three working days beginning with the day on which the complaint was made or, where that is not possible, as soon as reasonably practicable. We will aim to investigate and provide you with the findings as soon as we can and will provide regular updates regarding the investigation of your complaint.
When we look into your complaint we shall aim to:
- Find out what happened and what went wrong
- Make it possible for you to discuss the problem with those concerned, if you would like this
- Make sure you receive an apology, where this is appropriate
- Identify what we can do to make sure the problem will not happen again.
If you still remain dissatisfied after the above you may then refer to the parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) at the following address.
Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO)
Millbank Tower,
Millbank,
LONDON,
SW1P 4QP
Alternatively they are available by email at [email protected]
You can contact them by telephoning their helpline on 0345 015 4033. Calls are charged at a local rate from wherever you are in the United Kingdom, and the helpline is open from 08:30 to 17:30, Monday to Friday.
The PHSO carry out independent investigations into complaints about UK government departments and their agencies, and the NHS in England – and help improve public services as a result.
The practice would comment however, that within the NHS there is great emphasis on resolving complaints at a local level, and that the PHSO may refer a complaint back to the surgery for further review if it is felt that all measures to resolve your concerns have not been taken.
Should you remain dissatisfied therefore, we find that a face to face meeting with the doctors can be helpful to identify and address any outstanding issues, and if you wish, the complaints officer would be happy to arrange this for you. Please contact the surgery and ask for the practice manager if you feel such a meeting would be of benefit to you.
Thank you once again for bringing your concerns to our attention.