Agenda item

Consideration was given to the report of the Corporate Director, Neighbourhood Services, the purpose of which was to present performance and information in relation to complaints, compliments and suggestions for quarter 2 of 2012/13 and to highlight any learning outcomes resulting from them (for copy see file of Minutes).

The Customer Relations, Policy and Performance Manager, was in attendance to deliver the report and an overview presentation of the statutory, non statutory and Local Government Ombudsman complaints received throughout the period (for copy of slides see file of Minutes)

Members of the Committee expressed concerns regarding the level of complaints were received regarding planning issues. During the period, 32 Stage 1 complaints had been received by the Planning and Assets service.

The Customer Relations, Policy and Performance Manager advised that planning was very important and that more detailed work would be done in the future to look to reducing the number of planning related complaints.

The Deputy Monitoring Officer advised that planning was an area which would inevitably always generate complaints, as planning was a contentious area, and people were likely to make complaints should a planning application not be determined the way they had wished. Furthermore, Members were advised that as Central Government had introduced an expectation that a high percentage of planning applications would be now determined under delegated authority, it was likely that a lot less applications would be brought before planning committees for Member determination.

In response to a query from a Member, the Customer Relations, Policy and Performance Manager advised that in relation to complaints regarding missed bin collections and other such issues, these would be initially recorded as service requests. For example if a resident  made contact to notify that their bin had not been collected, that would not be logged as a complaint unless the resident specified that they wished to make a complaint. Such service requests were usually dealt with at the first point of contact and were not therefore recorded as complaints.

Resolved:

That the report be noted.