Fundraising complaints policy

The purpose of this policy is to set out the Charity’s approach to receiving and dealing with complaints, how you can make a complaint, what you can expect from the Charity when you do so and how you can escalate a complaint if you are unhappy with the outcome.

• Our Approach
• How you can file a complaint
• Complaints regarding Suppliers and Partners Delivering our Work
• How we review and investigate complaints
• Escalating a complaint to the Fundraising
• Regulator
• How we use your data
• Zero Tolerance

We take all complaints seriously and we will be in touch as soon as we can once you’ve told us your concern. This policy reflects our commitment to ensuring that we have effective and transparent procedures in place for fair and efficient handling of complaint. We will keep all complaints confidential to the extent possible, subject to the need to disclose information necessarily as part of any investigation, as required by statutory authorities such as the Charity Commission and/or as a result of legal or regulatory obligations placed on us. If you make a complaint, we will treat you with respect and we expect you to treat our staff in the same way.

If you would like to make a complaint, the best way to do this is by email. You can contact us at:

hello@gsttcharity.org.uk

0208 106 5433

Alternatively, if you would prefer to write to us, please address your complaint to:

Supporter Care Team – Complaints
The Grain House,
46 Loman Street,
London
SE1 0EH

In order to help us to effectively investigate your complaint, please could you set out the facts in as much detail as you can, as clearly as possible. In particular, please tell us:

• what happened.
• when it happened.
• who you dealt with.
• why you consider this to be a complaint; and
• what you would like us to do to address your complaint

You can make a complaint, comment or compliment to us directly in the case of work being delivered on our behalf by any supplier or partner (including professional charity fundraisers acting on our behalf). The Charity can assist you in escalating these issues to the relevant party.

We are committed to ensuring that our partners or suppliers delivering activities on our behalf or with our funding have an effective complaints management procedure. However, if necessary, the Charity will work with them to ensure issues are resolved in accordance with the internal standards set.

We take complaints seriously and all complaints will be investigated. We will take action in response to any failures identified by the complaint or investigation, if applicable.

We aim to respond to your complaint within 10 Business Days of receiving it:

a) If we have been able to resolve the complaint within that time, we shall include details of this and shall treat the matter as closed.

b) If a complaint requires further investigation, we will acknowledge receipt of your complaint and set out set who will be dealing with the complaint and their contact details (the “Complaint Lead”).

The Complaint Lead will investigate your complaint competently, diligently and as impartially as possible. They may need to speak to you further to gather such additional information as necessary in order to assess your complaint. They will consider the subject matter of the complaint, whether they consider the complaint should be upheld and, if so, what remedial action or redress the Charity may consider appropriate.

The Complaint Lead will usually advise you of their findings and the Charity’s conclusion within 30 days of the acknowledgement of receipt of your complaint. If we are unable to give a definitive response within that timeframe, for example because an investigation has not been fully completed, we send a progress report with an indication of when a full reply will be given.

Next steps

If you are not happy with our response, please let us know as soon as possible. Your complaint will be escalated to the Chief Executive of the Guy’s and St Thomas Foundation, who will carry out a review and let you know the outcome within 30 days.

The decision taken at this stage is final.

If you are still not satisfied with the outcome of your complaint, you may wish to refer your complaint to:

The Charity Commission – for complaints if you have a serious concern about our work, complete the online form and request an email or phone back. Alternatively, you can call 0300 066 9197 for the Charity Commission for England and Wales (CCEW).

The Fundraising Regulator – for complaints about fundraising or the way you’ve been asked for donations.

The Information Commissioner’s Office – for complaints about the use of your personal information call the helpline on 0303 123 1113.

If you use our complaints policy and procedure, you are agreeing that we can use any personal information you send us for purposes connected with your complaint. If you make a complaint to a supplier or partner, which relates to the Charity, by doing so you are agreeing that they can share your concerns with us.

We can usually only investigate complaints where the identity of the complainant is known so that it is possible to go back and verify information if needed. When an anonymous complaint is received of a serious nature, the Charity may consider investigating if there is enough information to guide further enquiries.

The details of any complaint received by the Charity (including name of complainant and details of the complaint) and the measures taken for its resolution will be logged in a complaints’ register which is maintained centrally by the Charity’s Legal Director.

If you have a complaint in relation to the handling of personal data, this should be made in accordance with the Charity’s Data Privacy Statement and raised with the Charity’s Data Protection Lead at: info@gsttfoundation.org.uk.

Our staff have the right not to be subjected to any behaviour or abuse that includes:

• Threats of physical harm or violence
• Religious, cultural or racial insults
• Homophobic, sexist or other derogatory remarks

Your conversation with The Charity may go unanswered or terminated if you display such behaviour and we will not hesitate to report any serious incidents to the relevant authority.

We recognise that the conclusion of our complaint handling may not always result in the outcome you hoped for. Once our complaints procedure has been exhausted, we will not consider further complaints on the same or substantially similar matter. Similarly, we will not consider any vexatious complaints.

A vexatious complaint is one which is deemed to be an inappropriate or improper use of this policy, and/or one which causes a disproportionate or unjustified level of disruption or distress and/or is persistent, extending beyond the procedure outlined in this policy. We will consider all relevant circumstances in order to reach a balanced conclusion as to whether a complaint is vexatious.