Complaints Procedure
This website is a preview of a clinic in development. No services are currently offered and no appointments are available. This procedure describes how a concern will be handled when the clinic opens.
This procedure explains how to raise a concern about your care or your experience here, what we will do about it, how long each stage takes, and where you may go if you remain dissatisfied.
Complaints about how we have used your information are dealt with in our Patient Privacy Notice..
If you would prefer to discuss any of this rather than read it, please ask and we will go through it with you.
Please tell us
1.1
If you are unhappy with any aspect of your care or your experience here, we would rather know. Most concerns are resolved quickly by raising them with the person involved or with the clinician responsible for your care.
1.2
Complaining will not affect your care, your membership, or how you are treated here. You may also ask someone to complain on your behalf, with your written consent.
How to complain
2.1
In person or by telephone, to any member of staff, or by asking to speak to the person responsible for complaints.
2.2
In writing, to the Complaints Manager, Velmont Institute, 121 Crawford Street, London W1U 6BE, or by email to velmontinstitute@gmail.com.
2.3
Please complain within twelve months of the event, or of becoming aware of it. We may still look into something older where there is good reason.
What happens then
01 Stage one — our investigation
We will acknowledge your complaint in writing within three working days and tell you who is handling it. We will investigate and give you a full written response within twenty working days. Where it is complex and will take longer, we will tell you why and keep you updated at least every twenty working days.
Our response will set out what we found, what we got wrong if we did, what we are changing, and where to go if you remain dissatisfied.
02 Stage two — review
If you are not satisfied, you may ask within twenty working days for a review by a senior person not previously involved. They will respond within twenty working days.
03 Stage three — independent adjudication
If you remain dissatisfied after stage two, you may refer the complaint to an independent adjudicator at no cost to you. We subscribe to the Independent Sector Complaints Adjudication Service (ISCAS), the recognised independent adjudicator for the private healthcare sector, and we are bound by its decisions. You must refer within six months of the date of our stage two response.
Independent Sector Complaints Adjudication Service
CEDR, 3rd Floor, 100 St Paul’s Churchyard, London EC4M 8BU
Telephone 020 7536 6091
Email info@iscas.org.uk
iscas.cedr.com
Before referring a complaint, it is worth reading the ISCAS Patients’ Guide and the ISCAS Code of Practice for Complaints Management, both available on their website. Stages one and two above follow that Code.
Other routes, and what each one does
You do not have to come to us first, and you may go elsewhere at any point.
Care Quality Commission
The Care Quality Commission regulates us and wants to hear about concerns, particularly about safety. It is important to be accurate about this: the CQC does not investigate or resolve individual complaints. It uses what it is told to inform its regulation of us.
General Medical Council
The General Medical Council handles concerns about the conduct or fitness to practise of an individual doctor. Concerns about a nurse go to the Nursing and Midwifery Council, and about a dental professional to the General Dental Council.
Information Commissioner’s Office
The Information Commissioner’s Office handles complaints about how we have used your information. This is also set out in our Patient Privacy Notice.
Legal action
Legal action is a separate route and taking it does not prevent you from complaining to us as well.
What we do with complaints
5.1
Every complaint is recorded, and the record is kept separately from your clinical record. We review them for patterns rather than only individually, and what we learn goes to our clinical governance meeting. We report on complaints to the Care Quality Commission as required.
5.2
Our duty of candour is separate from all of this: where something has gone wrong with your care, we will tell you without waiting to be asked.
Questions about this policy may be sent to velmontinstitute@gmail.com, or in writing to Velmont Institute, 121 Crawford Street, London W1U 6BE.
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