Thursday, July 31, 2014

Beware of going to the Health Service Ombudsman too quickly

So you've made a complaint and received a response which you are not happy with.

The response letter that you have received should, by virtue of section 14 of the NHS Complaints (England) Regulations will have to mention your right to go the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) if you are unhappy with the response.

Unfortunately what some response letters don't mention is that in most cases* the PHSO will not investigate your case if you have not put your concerns about the complaint response back to the NHS organisation involved who should then try and resolve these further concerns by either a written response or an offer of a Local Resolution meeting.

Sadly the poor wording of complaint responses can mean that people go to the PHSO to early only to get told to complete the local resolution process.

*I say most cases in that sometimes the PHSO will not expect you to get a further response. There are no specific set of circumstances where this applies but an example may be where there could be serious detrimental consequences to waiting for a further response. If you are unsure about whether you could go straight to the PHSO then give them a bell.



No comments:

Post a Comment