Feedback and Complaints Policy

Rural Health Connect (RHC) is committed to ensuring that any person or organisation using our services or affected by our operations has the right to provide feedback and make complaints about care and services.

Rural Health Connect ensures that its service users and others can provide feedback and make complaints without reprisal and promises to manage all complaints transparently. In this way, all concerns that are raised will be addressed in ways that ensure access and equity, fairness, accountability and continuous improvement.

We implement a complaints and appeals management system that:

  • Allows and supports any person to make a complaint or provide feedback;
  • Facilitates complaints by cultivating a supportive environment in which they can be made;
  • Is simple, accessible and easy to use;
  • Is proportionate to the size of our organisation and the services we provide;
  • Ensures complaints or appeals are fairly assessed and responded to promptly;
  • Is procedurally fair and complies with legislative requirements.

Principles

Rural Health Connect will:

  • Ensure that all clients, and their families and carers are encouraged and supported to raise any concerns they have about the service or organisation;
  • Consider all complaints it receives;
  • Treat all complainants with respect and recognise the importance of their concerns;
  • Maintain confidentiality of parties involved, keeping any information private to those directly involved in the complaint and its resolution, unless otherwise agreed/necessary or required by law;
  • Ensure support is available to clients who make a complaint and require support;
  • Resolve complaints, where possible, to the satisfaction of the complainant;
  • Deal with all complaints in a timely manner, and if necessary provide a formal response to the complainant within 1 week of the complaint being received (or on the spot if verbal complaint);
  • Keep relevant parties appropriately involved and informed of progress of the complaint;
  • Ensure that RHC staff are given information about the feedback and complaints procedure as part of their onboarding;
  • Ensure all service users, stakeholders and members are aware of how to offer feedback or make a complaint;
  • Ensure that a complainant is not penalised in any way or prevented from use of services during the progress of an issue;
  • Ensure that feedback data (both positive and negative) is considered in organisational reviews and in planning service improvements; and
  • Review the accessibility and effectiveness of the complaints management system and continually improve its processes.

Procedures

Information for clients and stakeholders

Informational on how to provide feedback or make a complaint is available on the Rural Health Connect website. A simple and easy to use form is accessible to submit online. RHC staff may also take feedback and complaints on phone calls or via email.

The RHC website will contain information on the following:

  • How to make a complaint and specify whether it is to be passed onto the treating practitioner;
  • Contact information;
  • What to expect

Training procedures

Staff will be trained on the complaints management procedures during their onboarding, and informally through Team meetings. This will include open communication strategies such as acknowledging the grievance without being defensive and making apologies while accepting responsibility for what occurred.

Making a complaint

A person wishing to make a complaint may do so in writing via email or verbally to the administration team or Director.

Complaints may be made by:

  • Submitting a completed Feedback and Complaints form via the RHC website (this can be done anonymously);
  • Written complaints may be sent to referrals@ruralhealthconnect.com.au or info@ruralhealthconnect.com.au. The administration team are responsible receiving this correspondence and directing it to the appropriate person;
  • Feedback and complaints via telephone may be made via the numbers on our website.

The Director is normally responsible for dealing with complaints, unless it is otherwise appropriate for the administration team to deal with and action feedback or complaints.

We support our clients, workers and referrers to make feedback, in an environment where it is clear that complaints can be made without fear of any reprisal.

If necessary, Rural Health Connect will provide complainants with support or interpreter services.

Lodging an appeal

Clients or their advocates may lodge an appeal if they disagree with a decision made by the organisation, or by a staff member, related to the resolution of a complaint. An appeal should be made in writing and submitted to the Director via email to RHC (referrals@ruralhealthconnect.com.au or info@ruralhealthconnect.com.au).

Procedure for complaints and appeals management

Any staff member may be a recipient of a complaint, and is responsible for:

  1. Receiving the complaint:
    • Listening to the complainant, acknowledging the concern raised, and explaining the next steps to the complainant; and
    • Discussing with the complainant an agreed upon resolution (for smaller matters) or referring the complaint on to the Director for further investigation and action. The chosen action will depend on the type and severity of the complaint.

    The person managing the complaint will be responsible for:

  2. Processing feedback, complaints or appeal:
    • Registering the feedback, complaint or appeal in the Feedback and Complaints Register; and
    • Informing the complainant that their complaint has been received and providing them with information about the process and time frame.
  3. Investigating the complaint or appeal:
    • Examining the complaint within 1 week of the complaint being received (or more timely if a significant incident);
    • Learn from the client how they want the situation handled. Do they want the complaint passed onto the practitioner? Do they want it to be escalated to official channels? Is there anything else they would like us to do?
    • Investigating the complaint, deciding how to respond and undertaking any actions; and
    • Informing the complainant by phone or email within 1 week (or as reasonable based on seriousness of matter) of the complaint being received of what is being done to investigate and resolve it, and the expected time frame for resolution.
  4. Responding to and resolving the complaint:
    • Immediately refer the complaint to the Director if relating to a serious incident, and/or making a decision on actions within 1 week of the complaint being received;
      • Inform the complainant of the outcome and the reasons for any decisions made;
      • upheld (and if so what will be done to resolve it);
      • resolved (and how this has been achieved); or
      • if no further action can be taken, the reasons for this;
    • Informing the complainant of any options for further action if required; and

    If the above time frame cannot be met, the complainant will be informed of the reasons why and of the alternative time frame for resolution. If things go wrong when reviewing a complaint or appeal, RHC will use an open disclosure process. Refer to our Open Disclosure Policy for further details.

  5. Reviewing the complaint:
    • If the complainant is not satisfied with the investigation and proposed resolution of their complaint or appeal, they can seek a further review of the matter by the Director.

Complaints involving specific staff members

The Director has delegated responsibility for resolving complaints or disputes involving staff members.

Internal complaints, where a staff member makes a complaint concerning another staff member, will be dealt with in accordance with the Grievances and Disputes Policy.

External complaints by clients or stakeholders made against a staff member will be managed by the Director who will:

  • Notify the staff member of the complaint and its nature;
  • Investigate the complaint and provide the staff member with an opportunity to respond to any issues raised;
  • Attempt to mediate the dispute (if appropriate) and/or attempt to resolve the matter to the satisfaction of the outside party; and
  • Take any other action necessary to resolve the issue.

Complaints involving the Director can be taken to the RHC Advisory Board or Clinical Governance Committee for resolution.

Cooperation in external investigations

If any person makes a complaint about Rural Health Connect to an external body (including police, Ombudsman) the Director will be responsible for liaising with the body responsible for investigating the issue. RHC will fully cooperate in any investigation which may take place, this includes participating in early resolution, conciliation, and/or reporting to the body about resolution and corrective actions if required.

Record keeping

A register of feedback complaints and appeals will be kept within the organisation register for a minimum of seven years after the complaint has been made. The register will be maintained by staff (with ultimate responsibility laying with the Director) and will record the following for each complaint or appeal:

  • Details of the complainant and the nature of the complaint;
  • Date lodged;
  • Action taken;
  • Resolution and reason for decision;
  • Complainant response (if relevant) and any further action.

If required for significant incidents, copies of all correspondence will be kept in the organisation Teams records, with the Complaints and Feedback Register.

Continuous improvement of the complaints management system

The complaints register and files will be confidential, and access is restricted to RHC staff. This register will be reviewed and monitored weekly within Team meetings. Register progress will also be reported to the Advisory Board or Clinical Governance Committee as appropriate (or at a minimum via annual report and as necessary for significant incidents).

Results from the annual report will be reviewed by the Advisory Board and used to:

  • Inform service planning by including a review of complaints and appeals in all service planning, monitoring and evaluation activities;
  • Inform decision making by including a report on complaints and appeals as a standard item on staff and management meeting agendas; and

RHC is committed to regularly reviewing and improving the effectiveness of its complaints management system. The complaints management system will be reviewed and evaluated annually. This will include:

  • Review of all complaint and feedback policies and procedures;
  • Client and staff feedback about the accessibility and effectiveness of the complaints management system; and
  • Implementation of a continuous improvement plan based on the review and feedback received.

Feedback and Complaints Flow Chart

Feedback and Complaints Flow Chart
Feedback and complaints workflow