Customer service policy

We realise that sometimes mistakes do happen, or we do not meet expectations, and our feedback process aims to respond to these concerns and prevent future issues through learning when things go wrong.

Your feedback is valuable to us as it can help us improve our service, and therefore the service you may receive in the future. That is why your feedback, positive or constructive, is so important to us.

This feedback policy supports our core values of:

Key principles

In considering complaints we apply the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) Principles of Good Complaints Handling, which are:  

• Getting it right – we will have an approach and systems in place that encourages colleagues to resolve complaints in a constructive manner;
• Being customer focused – we will make sure our processes are simple and accessible, and that we deal with complaints promptly and sensitively;
• Being open and accountable – we will provide clear and complete information on how to complain and how to take complaints further. We will give honest explanations and wherever practical, reasons for decisions;
• Acting fairly and proportionately – we will treat all customers fairly and without discrimination. We will make sure that complaints are investigated in an appropriate manner;
• Putting things right where possible – we will acknowledge our mistakes and apologise where appropriate. We will also take action to reduce the likelihood of those mistakes happening again; and
• Seeking continuous improvement – we will use complaints to understand what we can do better and to improve our work.

Feedback process

How to share feedback

You can send your feedback to feedback@hcpc-uk.org in writing, including:

• If this is Positive Feedback, Constructive Feedback, or a Service Complaint.
• Your name
• The application or FTP case number (if applicable). This will help us more quickly identify where this feedback relates.
• Your feedback on our service.
• Any HCPC staff relevant to the feedback.
• Any outcome you are looking for with this feedback.

Once the feedback is received the Feedback & Complaints team will review to assess the next steps, and reply to you acknowledging receipt.

Feedback response

We aim to respond to complaints within 15 working days.

If it is not possible to provide a full response in this time, for example because complexity of the matter or because we need to consult with multiple teams in the organisation or other relevant parties, we will keep you updated on the estimated response time.

Outcomes of feedback

A response to your complaint may include:

• An explanation of our policy and processes related to your feedback.
• An apology for any errors that have occurred.
• Learning points or action we have taken due to feedback.

Further feedback correspondence

We will carefully consider all complaints about our service and provide you with a full and clear response. We recognise that sometimes you may not agree with our response, or we may not be able to make changes or take action that you have requested. Disagreement or dissatisfaction with our complaint response in itself will not usually lead to further consideration of your complaint.

However, if you feel that our complaint response has not addressed or has misunderstood your concerns and you would like us to consider it again, you should set out detailed reasons as to why our response was not adequate. Your comments will then be reviewed and, if appropriate, the Feedback and Complaints Manager may pass the complaint back to the original responder to try to resolve your outstanding concerns. For complex matters, we may decide to ask a more senior manager to carry out this review and/or provide a response as necessary.

If we decide that the response raises nothing new or which has not already been addressed, we will not take any further action.

If you remain dissatisfied after this stage, any further correspondence that you send to us will be logged and acknowledged, but unless we determine that it raises new material issues, we will not respond further on the points made.

Feedback reporting at HCPC

Feedback is reported annually to the Audit and Risk Assurance Committee.

We regularly review and update our internal processes in light of learning from feedback and complaints we receive, such as implementing changes, and as tools in training our employees and partners.