Essential information Comments or complaints about your care or support service You should feel able to comment on, compliment or complain about any aspect of your care or support service that affects your happiness, comfort or wellbeing. This applies whether you are in residential care or receiving support in your own home. Your concerns might be about anything, from the way you are treated by the staff to the quality of the food you are served. In residential care, you should feel able to make comments and suggestions about possible improvements to your surroundings and the services provided. It should not be difficult for you to make a comment or complaint, and you should feel that your concerns are being taken seriously. Under national essential standards of quality and safety, all care services must have a simple and easy-to-use complaints procedure. If you are concerned about the care that you, or a friend or relative, are getting from a service, it makes sense to speak to the manager of the service about your concerns before you take any further action. The problem may be resolved quite easily once they are made aware of it. If someone else is raising a complaint on your behalf, they should ensure that they have your written permission first. If you feel that your concerns are not being taken
seriously and nothing is being done to change things, you should contact the registered owners of the service. The law says that the registered owners must respond to any complaints made. If the registered owner is not the service manager, the service manager will give you the address to contact the owner. If you’re not satisfied with the response you receive, and you pay for the care without assistance from the local authority, you can make a complaint to the Local Government & Social Care Ombudsman (LGO). Local Government & Social Care Ombudsman PO Box 477, Coventry CV4 OEH Tel: 0300 061 0614 Text: 07624 811595 (just text ‘call back’ to this number and an LGO adviser will call you) Web: www.lgo.org.uk If you receive care from a council-approved provider, you can ask your local Adult Social Care complaints team for help or to make a complaint on your behalf. If you think the service is not meeting national standards or Care Quality Commission (CQC) regulations, you can contact the CQC, see page 57.
Complaints, comments or compliments about Adult Social Care Adult Social Care is always pleased to hear what you have to say about the services it provides. Please don’t be afraid to raise your concerns, as the team can try to put things right for you as soon as possible. They can also learn from your comments and complaints, which can only help to improve services. Adult Social Care also wants to hear your compliments when things go well, or if you have any comments or ideas for how things could be done better. East Sussex If you want to make a comment, complaint or compliment about Adult Social Care services, the
leaflet ‘Your feedback is important to us’ explains the process. You can get it from www.eastsussex.gov.uk or from Health and Social Care Connect, or from the complaints team directly. Tel: 01273 481242 Email: asccommentscomplaints@eastsussex.gov.uk Write to: Complaints team, Adult Social Care, East Sussex County Council, County Hall, St Anne’s Crescent, Lewes, East Sussex BN7 1UE If you need an interpreter or sign-language interpreter, this can be arranged for you. >>
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