Have feedback, concerns or complaints?
- We are constantly striving to improve our services – and the practice is always happy to receive feedback. The highest compliment we can receive is the referral of a family member, friend, or colleague. It shows that you trust us and are confident that we will take good care of your loved ones, which we will! We are always accepting new patients and appreciate the opportunity to meet other great people who are an extension of you. We do our best to serve you and truly appreciate your feedback on how we are doing. In this practice we take your concerns or complaints very seriously indeed and try to ensure that all our patients are pleased with their experience of our service. When patients complain, they are dealt with courteously and promptly so that the matter is resolved as quickly as possible.
This procedure is based on these objectives. Our aim is to react to complaints in the way in which we would want our complaint about a service to be handled. We learn from every mistake that we make and we respond to customers concerns in a caring and sensitive way.
The person responsible for dealing with any complaint about the service which we provide is Mrs Veronica Richards, who is the Complaint Manager
- If a patient complains on the telephone or in person we will listen to their complaint and offer to refer him or her to Veronica. If Veronica is not available at the time, then the patient will be told when they will be able to talk to her or the dentist and arrangements will be made for this to happen. The member of staff will take brief details of the complaint and pass them on. If we cannot arrange this within a reasonable period or if the patient does not wish to wait to discuss the matter, arrangements will be made for someone else to deal with it.
- If the patient complains in writing the letter will be passed on immediately to the Complaints Manager.
- If a complaint is about any aspect of clinical care or associated charges it will normally be referred to the dentist, unless the patient does not want this to happen.
- We will acknowledge the patients complaint in writing and enclose a copy of this code of practice as soon as possible, normally within three working days. We will seek to investigate the complaint within an appropriate time frame to give an explanation of the circumstances which led to the complaint. If the patient does not wish to meet us, then we will attempt to talk to them on the telephone. If there are any unexpected delays we will notify the patient, giving reasons for the delay and a likely period within which the investigation will be completed.
- We will confirm the decision about the complaint in writing immediately after completing our investigation.
- Proper and comprehensive records are kept of any complaint received.
- The responsible person for all complaints is Mr Ara Madani and he will have overall responsibility for the signing off of all complaints.
An NHS patient can complain directly to:
NHS England, PO Box 16738, Redditch, B97 9PT 0300 311 2223
However, the patient can only complain once, to the Practice or NHS England – not both.
- If patients are not satisfied with the result of our investigation then further action can be taken by contacting one of the following :
For Private Treatment
The Dental Complaints Service 020 8253 0800
For NHS Treatment
Health Service Ombudsman, Millbank Tower, London SW1P 4QP (0345 015 4033)
For all types of treatment
The General Dental Council, 37 Wimpole Street, London, W1M 8DQ 0207 167 6000