Council receives high rate of complaints

Kieran Molloy, Local democracy reporter.

A report has revealed that Vale of Glamorgan Council has the 4th highest rate of complaints per 1000 residents for any local authority in Wales.

The data was collected by the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales, a public body watchdog, as part of the annual audit of the council..

The watchdog also found that over half of the complaints (55 per cent) were not resolved within internal target timescales, although almost all complaints were resolved within three months

It also found the proportion of complaints upheld had increased from 53.22 per cent to 66.67 per cent over the last three years, causing the council to move to having the 5th highest rate of upheld complaints.

This means that two thirds of complaints investigated by the council were found to have some element of service failure.

This is in line with a Wales-wide trend that has been rising over the last three years.

The report reads: “The most frequent drivers of complaints remain consistent year-on-year and relate to service failure, communication issues, and staff behaviours.”

Vale of Glamorgan’s Environment and Housing Directorate received 715 complaints, with 24 being escalated to a higher stage.

However, this was due to the “the high number of direct resident interactions” received by the directorate.

During a council meeting discussing the report, vice-chair of meeting Nigel Ireland said the report had “some interesting if slightly worrying reading”.

The report reads: “A number of improvement actions have been agreed and have been included in the Corporate Resources service Directorate plan.”

A workshop was held in early February to “consider how complaints can be used positively to improve services, reduce future demand, make better use of resources and deliver better outcomes for residents.”

Further improvement actions focus on “preventative actions that will enable [the council] to sustain and future proof [its] services into the longer term.”

The council give “clear priority for action” as strengthening service resilience, improving the reliability and timelines of service delivery and enhancing communication with residents.

The report reads: “Addressing these areas will help reduce repeat contact, improve customer confidence, and support teams to deliver a more consistent standard of service across the organisation.”