Lead Member – Councillor Alex Wagner, Deputy Leader and Communities

Lead Officer – Tim Collard, Service Director - Legal and Governance

RESOLVED:

3.1  to consider the recommendations and actions in the Annual Customer Feedback Report (pages 30 and 31) to support and improve customer feedback performance within Shropshire Council.

3.2  to note that a paper on the adoption of the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code will be prepared for a future Cabinet Meeting (September 2025).

Cllr Alex Wagner, Deputy Leader and Portfolio Holder for Communities introduced the Annual Customer feedback report 2024 – 2025.   The report highlighted an increase in customer feedback cases, with a notable rise in complex cases, particularly at stage two and involving Education, Health, and Care Plans (EHCPs). The average response time for stage one complaints has improved to 23 days, but 28% of these responses were overdue, with variability in handling cases across different services.

The report also covered the Ombudsman's complaint handling code, which would be used to assess complaints and recommendations from April 2026. This code would require significant changes in the council's ways of working, including logging stage one complaints within five days and responding within 10 days, with extensions allowed for another 10 days if necessary. There would be no associated additional resource to implement the new code, and the focus would need to be on demand mitigation and better responses to service requests to prevent complaints from arising in the first place.

The report set out recommendations focusing on developing new guidance and remedies, improving customer experience, addressing the increase in complex cases, and supporting staff in handling these cases. A separate report would be presented to a future meeting to assess compliance with the Ombudsman's code and outline the council's response to the new requirements. The importance of scrutiny work and preventing complaints was also highlighted, and the Deputy Leader welcomed a suggestion that scrutiny chairs be involved in reviewing relevant sections of the report.

RESOLVED:

3.1  to consider the recommendations and actions in the Annual Customer Feedback Report (pages 30 and 31) to support and improve customer feedback performance within Shropshire Council.

3.2  to note that a paper on the adoption of the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code will be prepared for a future Cabinet Meeting (September 2025).