Job summary
- Main area
- Administrative and Clerical
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 4
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full time - 37.5 hours per week (Core Office Hours (Monday to Friday))
- Job ref
- 409-7463021
- Employer
- Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Southport Hospital
- Town
- Southport
- Salary
- £27,485 - £30,162 per annum
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 02/11/2025 23:59
Employer heading
Patient Experience & Complaints Officer
NHS AfC: Band 4
After applying via NHS Jobs, your submitted application will be imported into our preferred Third-party recruitment system. All subsequent information regarding your application will be generated from apps.trac.jobs. You will not be able to track the progress of your application or receive messages through the NHS Jobs website, and furthermore, as an employer, we will not be able to respond to any e-mails sent to us via the NHS Jobs website. By applying for this post you are agreeing to "name of trust" transferring the information contained in this application to its preferred applicant management system. If you are appointed to a post information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system.
Job overview
The Patient Experience and Complaints Officer will liaise with staff at all levels on the behalf of the Chief Executive to enable them to discharge the Trust's duties in relation to the NHS Complaints Regulations (2009).
The Patient Experience and Complaints Officer will liaise with the Complaints Manager to ensure that systems and policies are in place to ensure corporate responsibilities related to complaints management.
To support the Complaints Manager in motivating the clinical services to provide the best possible customer service through the sharing of sophisticated, relevant and timely patient experience intelligence.
To proactively manage complaints within stipulated time scales, escalating to the Complaints Manager when complaints risk breaching timescales, completeness and quality requirements.
To gather intelligence on completion of complaints related action plans from the clinical services, store this electronically within Inphase, and generate reports which inform services across the Trust and wider public about how the organisation addresses complaints.
To receive all patient related queries, grade within the grading system, appraise the Complaints Manager appropriately, and direct towards the relevant service as quickly as possible.
To proactively liaise with clinical services to enable the service address and resolve any complaint or query on an informal and speedy basis directly with the patient and or relative.
Main duties of the job
To act as a daily point of contact for patients, and families who wish to engage with the complaints service.To deal with complaints of a sensitive, complex nature, some of which maybe multi stranded and delicate.To provide responses to complaints and queries in a format that is accessible to alleviate barriers to understanding.
Ensure complainants are regularly and pro-actively keep up to date on the progress of their complaint. To work collaboratively with counterpart complaints staff in other NHS and Social Care Services when dealing with multi stranded complaints.
Organising the information they need in order to draft a complaints response letter for the Chief Nurse.
Assist with the interpretation and evaluation of requests and instructions from the Ombudsman, CQC, ICB and respond within their guidelines.
To arrange and attend key meetings in relation to complaints, including meeting with complainant. Carry out agreed action points, in a timely manner. Take notes of such meetings and disseminate the notes appropriately within agreed time scales maintaining confidentiality. To meet with patients, relatives, or families face to face during complaints meeting.
Manipulation of the information system to enable the production of regular, accurate and timely reports for the appropriate committees or meetings.
Ensure that all evidence used in the complaint response is electronically filed and linked to the complaint within the Inphase system.
Working for our organisation
Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust serves a population of over 600,000 with a workforce of over 10,500 dedicated and skilled staff across 21 sites.
We strongly believe that the communities we serve should all have access to Five Star Patient Care.
Our services:
Acute Care
Providing emergency and maternity services at Whiston, Southport and Ormskirk hospitals, and medical and surgical specialties across all our sites.
Primary Care
Providing primary care services at Marshalls Cross Medical Centre situated in St Helens Hospital.
Community Services
Providing adult community services for St Helens and a wheelchair service in Chorley, South Ribble, and West Lancashire. Our inpatient unit at Newton Community Hospital is where patients needing acute hospital beds can continue rehabilitation. We also provide urgent care at our Urgent Treatment Centre located in St Helens town centre.
Specialist Regional Services
We provide the Mersey Regional Burns & Plastic Surgery Unit at Whiston Hospital and the Spinal Injuries Unit at Southport Hospital to more than 4 million people across the whole of Merseyside, West Lancashire, Cheshire, Isle of Man and North Wales.
Achievements:
- Rated Outstanding by CQC Inspection August 2018
- Top 100 places to work in the NHS (NHS Employers & Health Service Journal)
- National Preceptorship Accreditation (2023) for Nursing & AHP Preceptorship Programme
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
To abide by the relevant Codes of Professional Practice if applicable and NHS Codes of Conduct.
It is a requirement of employment within Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospital NHS Trust that all staff must comply with the obligation of confidentiality to person identifiable information. The Data Protection Act 1998 safeguards the handling of information held in both electronic and manual filing systems and it is the duty of all staff employed by the trust to uphold the principles of the Act.
Any employee disclosing confidential/patient records or information to any unauthorised person or persons will render the employee subject to disciplinary action.
The Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires all public organisations to provide any member of the public, upon receipt of a written request, with the information they require, subject to certain exemptions. Every member of staff employed by the Trust must take responsibility for any request for information that they receive and respond in line with Mersey and West Lancashire NHS Teaching Hospital Trust’s Freedom of Information Policy and guidance.
All employees are required by Section 7 of the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974) to take reasonable care of their own health and safety and that of others who may be affected by their acts or omissions.
All staff employed by Trust must adhere to the standards of record keeping outlined in the Records Management Policy and guidance documents.
To ensure compliance with all Trust Risk Management, Research Governance and Infection Control Policies and Procedures and abide by the Essential Standards of quality and safety.
Undertake appropriate Induction and Mandatory training, including infection control and comply with all Trust Infection Control policies relevant to the post, particularly with regard to the hand hygiene policy. To remind and challenge colleagues of their Infection Prevention and Control responsibilities if there is a potential or actual breach of policy.
It is incumbent on the post holder to continually update his/her professional awareness and carry out other duties deemed appropriate to the grade of the post.
The post holder is required to take all reasonable measures in relation to their health and well-being.
The post holder is required to adhere to Trust procedures in relation to Equality and Diversity, including the Staff Charter and NHS Constitution.
Staff must be aware of and comply with Safeguarding Policies and Procedures for both adults and children in order to promote safeguarding and prevent abuse to vulnerable people who may be working, visiting or receiving treatment within the organisation. All staff have a responsibility to report any suspicion of abuse to their Line Manager or Safeguarding Leads.
This job description is not intended to be exhaustive but to indicate the main responsibilities of the post and may be amended from time to time after consultation with the post holder.
The duties listed above may change over time and additional duties may be required appropriate to the pay band of the post.
Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria
- Higher Diploma level knowledge or equivalent experience with a willingness to undertake further development
Desirable criteria
- ECDL
- Project Management qualification or equivalent experience
Knowledge & Experience
Essential criteria
- Significant experience of dealing with NHS complaints
- Evidence of proficiency in the use of Microsoft Systems, especially, Word, Excel and PowerPoint
Desirable criteria
- Experience of working in a complaint’s environment
- Experience of working in the NHS and a wide understanding of the Healthcare agenda and how it works with partner and regulatory agencies
- Able to communicate during highly emotional, stressful and sensitive complaints to a wide range of staff, and external stakeholders and patients and their families
- Knowledge of the NHS complaints procedures, legislation and clinical governance
- Knowledge of medical terminology
- Experience of working with Datix / Inphase
- Experience in systems development and implementation
- Experience of healthcare governance including knowledge of corporate governance and assurance frameworks
Skills
Essential criteria
- Clear and confident communicator with excellent interpersonal skills, demonstrating good listening and empathy
- Ability to maintain strict confidentiality
- Problem solving skills and able to manage own time effectively. Work autonomously without direct supervision and be able to adapt to conflicting demands as required
- Effective communication skills – verbally and non-verbal
- Able to use initiative when resolving issues
- Analytical skills, with a proven ability to pay attention to detail, identifying patient concerns and complaint questions
- Able to record data and information with a high degree of accuracy into relevant systems (inphase)
- Ability to manage conflicting demands and only escalate issues appropriately to higher management
Desirable criteria
- Facilitating and leading local resolution meeting with hospital staff, patient, family and carers
Other
Desirable criteria
- Prolonged periods of sitting at a desk using computer / laptop
- The role will require frequent concentration, for enquires, complaints, the work pattern is unpredictable
- Frequent exposure to distressing and emotional circumstances when dealing with relatives, and or patients who may have suffered personal injury or loss
- An ability to maintain concentration levels in an open office working environment
- To deal with occasional verbal aggression from patients, relatives and carers
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Applicant requirements
The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Rachel Hale
- Job title
- PALS & Complaints Manager
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Telephone number
- 01704 705524
List jobs with Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust in Administrative Services or all sectors