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Compliments, Complaints and Concerns

Bluebird Care Isle of Wight Compliments, Complaints and Concerns Policy

BBCE35C Customer Guide on Compliments, Complaints and Concerns (England)


Bluebird Care Isle of Wight is a UK wide franchised health and social care organisation. The Director(s) of this business is «Directors» and the Registered Manager of the business is «Manager». The business is regulated by the Health and Social Care Regulator CQC.

At Bluebird Care Isle of Wight we listen to feedback about our services and take any concerns seriously.  We look into all complaints and inform customers what we find.  Where there are shortfalls, we will take prompt action to put this right.

Please let us know if you would like a copy of this information on ‘Compliments, Concerns and Complaints’ in an alternative language, Braille or in large print.

This guidance is for all customers, their relatives, advocates and other professionals involved in a customer’s care who may wish to raise a concern or complaint regarding the service provided by Bluebird Care Isle of Wight.

At Bluebird Care Isle of Wight we welcome all of your comments, whether these are concerns, complaints or compliments.  Compliments help us to know what we are doing well. We tell our colleagues about the compliments we receive for them.

We are committed to providing you with excellent quality.  We make every effort to achieve this; however, if something is not good enough, we want you to tell us so that we can improve our services.

Concerns or complaints may be about a delay, an unreliable or poor standard of service, discourtesy or a failure to talk to you about how your care and support is carried out.

So please let us know if:

  • You think we have not done something well enough
  • We have not done something that we said we would do
  • You are not satisfied with a particular service that we provide

We understand that it might be difficult for you to complain because you may be worried that this could affect your service.  Please be assured that we will take your complaints or concerns seriously and will never treat you differently because you have made a complaint. It is your right to complain and our opportunity to learn from you.

You may choose to make a complaint anonymously; however, this may limit our ability to look into your concerns properly. Also, we will not be able to inform you of an outcome.

What to do

You (or your family/friend/advocate) can raise a concern, make a complaint or tell us about something we’ve done well, either in writing (including email) or by phoning or calling into our offices:

Address: Suite 6, 30 Quay St, Newport PO30 5BA, United Kingdom
Telephone number: 01983 526 776
Email: isleofwight@bluebirdcare.co.uk

If you need help to do any of the above, we will offer you support.  We can give you information about local advocacy services. An advocate will support you to express your views.  

Alternatively, you may wish to ask someone to help you such as a friend, relative, MP, advocate or someone else that you trust or a voluntary/council agency. We can also arrange for you to communicate with someone in sign language.

How we will deal with your concern or complaint

We will always:

  • Be sensitive and listen carefully to your concerns;
  • Discuss the nature of your concerns with you and decide what needs to happen;
  • Record your concern or complaint and the action that we take.

If your concern can be resolved through a telephone call, then we will do this without delay. For example, your Care Assistant who is usually punctual has not arrived on time.  However, if you tell us something more serious or make a formal complaint, we may need to carry out a full investigation.  In these cases we will:

  • Acknowledge your complaint in writing within 2 working days and tell you how we will look into it, the name of the person who will be dealing with your complaint and when you can expect to know the outcome.
  • Investigate your complaint thoroughly and impartially without delay.  This may include looking at our records or talking to your Care Expert if the complaint is about them.
  • If other agencies are involved, we may need to talk to them. If we think that you may be at risk from abuse then we may need to refer the matter to the relevant Adult Social Services Department and notify the CQC.
  • In most cases, we will ask your permission first. Sometimes we may need to pass on information about you if we believe that a criminal offence may have been committed or if you are at risk, but are not able to understand this.
  • When we have looked into your complaint, we will write to you to tell you what we have found and what we will do to put things right. You will usually receive this report within 15 days; or if in Wales we will aim to have your complaint resolved and a written report to you in 14 days, but could extend this to 28 days with the complainant’s agreement. You will have up to ten working days to tell us if you are satisfied with our response and to make any comments.
  • We will keep you advised of progress relating to your complaint on at least a weekly basis. In exceptional circumstances, there may be slight delays. In these cases, we will try and agree a longer time frame with you.
  • If your complaint relates to poor performance or conduct by a Care Expert then this is likely to be managed under our  disciplinary procedures.  We are happy to provide you with a copy of this procedure upon request.
Getting help to take your complaint further

If you are unhappy about the way we have dealt with your complaint, you may wish to take the matter further. You can:

Tell the regulator for adult health and social care if you think that our service may be in breach of its statutory duties. The regulator will look into cases where the provider of services may be failing to comply with essential standards of quality and safety:

  • Contact your Local Authority Social Services Department (if you receive help with funding towards your care):
  • Ask the Ombudsman to investigate the matter on your behalf. The Ombudsman will investigate cases of maladministration. It cannot look into the decision made by us but can look into the way in which a decision was reached. This service is free of charge and is available to customers who fund their own care as well as customers who receive funding from their local authority. Please be aware that the ombudsman will check that Bluebird Care «Franchise» (and the local authority for customers who receive help with funding) has had a fair opportunity to deal with your complaint first.
  • Care Quality Commission (CQC). CQC is the independent regulator of health and adult social care in England. They make sure health and social care services provide people with safe, effective, compassionate, high-quality care and they encourage care services to improve.They monitor, inspect and regulate services and publish what they find.  If you would like to know more about the CQC you can view their leaflet here: https://www.cqc.org.uk/sites/default/files/20170504_CQC_About-us.pdf(link is external)
  • Obtain further advice and information from the Home Care Association (HCA). Bluebird Care Isle of Wight is a member of this trade association:

 

What we will do with the information from concerns and complaints

We want to learn from all concerns and complaints. Therefore we will use information about service failures to improve the way that we work. 

All complaints and concerns received by Bluebird Care Isle of Wight will be recorded and stored securely and confidentially. These records will be available to the regulatory bodies when they carry out their inspections to check that we are meeting the regulations.

This document will be reviewed on a minimal 2 yearly basis, or as and when required. 

The following are applicable legislation, regulation and relevant documentation applicable to this policy:

  • BBCE35 Compliments, Complaints and Concerns (Internal Policy)