Event Summary

Tightening budgets and increasing demand have piled pressure on public sector complaint systems, with calls for more streamlined, effective and user-friendly procedures.

Bringing together attendees from across local and central government, health, housing, police, emergency services and the third sector, Westminster Insight’s fifth annual Complaint Handling in the Public Sector Conference will explore impactful strategies and learnings from best practice organisations.

A senior line up of experts, including different Ombudsman services, will explore how the narrative around complaint handling can be shifted to promote a culture of learning. How are others working towards national standards across the public sector to improve outcomes for services and their users?

Best practice case studies will focus on the adoption of proactive strategies to handle complaints and ensure that complaints lead to service improvement.

Improve early identification and boost early resolution to reduce the number of Stage 2 complaints. Ensure that your investigations into complaints are robust, in-depth and evidence-backed to reach resolution in a transparent and timely manner. When challenging customers pose a barrier to resolution, learn how can you better provide your staff with the tools and skills needed to diffuse complex situations.

Faced with an increased volume of complaints, we will share guidance on how to optimise your pre-existing infrastructure and systems to get complaints right at scale, especially when dealing with limited resources and capacity.

Join us in central London to network with colleagues and learn from best practice across the public sector.

Key Points

  • Learning from mistakes and implementing a culture of improvement
  • Using complaints as feedback: improving services and outcomes
  • Early resolution: de-escalating complaints
  • Pros and cons of “goodwill gestures” or compensation
  • Realistic targets based on your own budget, company size and resources
  • Setting expectations: communicating effectively with customers/service users
  • Handling complaints from customers with mental health conditions: adapting approaches for individual needs
  • Managing multi-channel and indirect complaints from third parties

Venue details

In-person – This conference will take place at a central London venue, to be announced shortly. Attend this full-day event in person to network, build relationships and learn from your peers.