Myddelton House
115-123 Pentonville Road
London N1 9LZ
www.citizensadvice.org.uk
Tel: 020 7833 2181
March 13 2008
Dear Mr Ribsskog
Your complaint against Liverpool Central CAB
This is the third stage of the Citizens Advice complaints procedure. The aim of the review is to look at how your complaint was handled by the CAB at local level and to check that the fundamental issues were addressed. I have read through the case file and correspondence.
Chronology of your complaint
In February 2007 you saw a duty solicitor at the bureau for advice on how to deal with harassment at work. .
In March you again attended the bureau and asked to see a solicitor. It appears that you were allowed to use the bureau phone and were put in touch with an external solicitor.
You were given an appointment to see a duty solicitor on April 5th, but this meeting was cancelled as the solicitor was unable to attend the bureau.
On May 18th 2007 you contacted the Complaints Officer at Citizens Advice by phone, explained that you wanted to make a complaint against Liverpool Central CAB, and that you would send a more detailed complaint by email.
On May 23rd you sent a 53 page complaint by email plus an additional 30 plus attachments which were not directly related to your complaint.
On May 31st the Complaints Officer emailed to confirm that she had been in contact with the bureau, that they had located the notes related to your case, that your complaints material had been forwarded on to them, and that a member of their managerial team would now investigate your complaint.
Stage 1 - review by the General Unit Coordinator (GUC)
On September 6th the GUC sent you his full response by email. His review:
Confirmed that you had been interviewed, on a free 30 minute basis, by a duty solicitor on February 27th 2007. The notes taken indicated that the solicitor felt you might have a claim for harassment but there was insufficient time to get full details during that interview.
In response to your complaint that you should have been informed beforehand that further advice from the solicitor would be charged stated that the initial interview was given on a payment free basis but that any subsequent issues you had with the solicitor needed to be taken up directly with them.
Explained what had happened when you arrived for your appointment with the Employment Duty Solicitor i.e. that unfortunately the EAD had to cancel their session at the last minute and the bureau had been unable to inform you of this.
You apparently contacted the EAD directly and were informed that regardless of the missed appointment you were out of time to commence with employment tribunal proceedings. You stated that you asked how the legal aid system worked but were told by the solicitor that he was unable to discuss the issue in detail over the phone.
Stated that as far as he was concerned you had received a free initial consultation as per the standard rota system.
The GUC then went on to address some specific points that you had raised:
He explained that he had not set up an appointment for the next available duty solicitor slot after April 5th as it would not have been possible for you to see a solicitor until May and this may have impacted on legal time limits.
Confirmed that the bureau only has details of which practice will be providing a solicitor for rota duty, not the name of the individual solicitor.
Confirmed that reception staff cannot provide detailed information on the legal aid process.
Confirmed that the solicitors practice in question was Liverpool based.
Apologized for accidentally providing you with the fax number for the practice, not the main telephone number.
Stated that the lights in the bureau were partially off when you attended in April because the bureau was in fact closed for lunch.
Confirmed that clients are made aware in advance that only the initial 30 minute consultation with the duty solicitor is free of charge.
Confirmed that the bureau cannot be held responsible for the actions of a solicitor after the initial consultation.
The GUC concluded by stating that if you were dissatisfied with his response you were entitled to a further review by the bureau Chair.
Stage 2 – review by the Chair of the Trustee Board
On October 27th you sent an email requesting a further review by the Chair of the Trustee Board. During this period there seems to have been some difficulties with email contact which may explain the delay in the production of this review. The copy of the response I have is undated but I have been told by the bureau that it was sent to you on December 14th 2007. In your request for a review you set out the reasons why you were not happy with the response given by the bureau.
In his response the Chair:
Set out what he considered to be the main points of your complaint.
Confirmed that the GUC had not made another appointment for you to see an EAD but had followed standard procedure and provided you with details for the solicitors practice so that you could instead make direct contact. This was to ensure that you received advice straight away and were not inconvenienced by the cancelled appointment.
Stated that the GUC had not rescheduled the appointment due to potential legal deadlines.
Explained how the duty solicitor system works.
Confirmed that in general the CAB does not know the names of individual solicitors who attend the duty session.
Confirmed that the solicitors practice in question was based in central Liverpool.
Again apologised for the fact that you were given the wrong contact number.
Stated that the lights in the bureau were turned off because it was lunch time.
Stated that clients are informed by reception staff that only the first 30 minutes with the duty solicitor are free of charge. He stated that it was the responsibility of the solicitor, not the CAB, to explain the legal aid process to clients.
Concluded by providing details of the next stage in the standard complaints procedure.
On February 11th 2008 Sue Thomas, Head of Advice Policy and Standards at Citizens Advice, received a number of e-mails from you. At this point it became clear that you were not happy with the way your complaint had been handled by the bureau. You also raised concerns about the lack of contact by Citizens Advice in the early stages. Your complaint therefore was moved to the next stage and referred for review under my direction.
Conclusions
There was a four month delay between the receipt of your complaint and the initial response from the bureau. Whilst I appreciate that there was a lot of material involved in your complaint, this falls well outside of the organisational deadlines and is not acceptable. The stage 2 review also seems to have been completed outside the usual deadlines, again with no evidence of contact with you to explain the delay.
I would ask bureau staff to re-familiarise themselves with the standard procedure for handling complaints. There may be a substantive explanation for this, but unfortunately it is not documented in the file notes and clearly had not been communicated to you.
I am concerned that there seem to be no notes documenting what action was taken by the bureau following your initial interview with the duty solicitor in February and I would ask that bureau staff re-familiarise themselves with the organisational requirements and standards of case recording.
Turning to the content of the reviews, both addressed the issues that you have raised in some depth. Your complaint is lengthy in nature considering that your contact with the bureau has been minimal.
I am satisfied that the bureau made acceptable arrangements for you to seek legal advice in this matter, the issues that you raised are certainly too specialised for the bureau to deal with.
You have raised a number of issues about the bureau environment; these have already been addressed in some detail and I do not feel I can add anything that would help.
Finally, I would like to turn to your issues about the way your complaint was dealt with by Citizens Advice. You first spoke to our Complaints Officer (Saffron Follows) on 18th May and e-mailed her your complaint on 23rd May. On 31st May she replied to say she had contacted the bureau and you should hear from them in 20 working days.
You have given us copies of e-mails sent to Saffron dated 5th July and 22nd July to which you received no response. You also supplied copies of e-mails sent to me on August 3rd and August 16th and my automatically generated ‘out of office’ reply dated August 22nd. As a result of these emails Saffron contacted the bureau at the end of August in order to chase progress. I apologise that you were not made aware of this action and appreciate how this may have added to your frustration.
Overall I will apologise for the delays in dealing with your initial complaint and the lack of responsiveness from this office. I certainly uphold your complaint in that respect. However I feel that the bureau did deal fully with the issues you raise though can see that you are not happy with their responses. Bureaux have to find ways of coping with the demand for their advice services, and it is not inappropriate for bureaux to work closely with local solicitors to help provide advice.
If you are unhappy with this review, you have the right to a final review conducted by an Adjudicator who is independent of Citizens Advice. The aim of the Adjudicator’s review is to assess whether the complaint’s investigation had been handled fairly and in line with procedures. If you would like such a review, please write to me, stating the points in my review on which you disagree.
Yours sincerely,
David Harker
Chief Executive
Cc Chair of Liverpool Central CAB
Patron HRH The Princess Royal Citizens Advice is an operating name of
Chair The Revd. Hilary Watkins The National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux
Chief Executive David Harker OBE Charity registration number 279057
VAT number 726 0202 76
Company limited by guarantee
Registered number 1436945 England
Registered office as above