Complaints are an important part of any organisations ability to be able to review what they do and make improvements. Whilst the purpose of making a complaint is to put something right for the individual, it is important for us to ensure we are learning from complaints, where our practices may have resulted in hardship or inconvenience for customers.

We share our learning in our Complaints Annual Report, below is a snapshot of the key learning between March 2024 and April 2025.

Individual learning from Stage 1 and 2 complaints

What went wrong?

What did we learn?

What did we change?

Advice not given to customer earlier enough regarding insurance process.

Referrals to SMBC insurance team aren’t always completed.

Updated training for complaint handlers to ensure understanding of the role of the insurance process for customers.

Delayed roof repairs and customers unaware of time frames.

Roof and scaffolding process needed.

Introduced a process to track these types of repairs and keep customers informed.

Stage 1 complaint did not consider appropriate remedy.

Improved training needed for complaint handlers.

Introduction of centralised complaints team.

Customer passed between SMBC and SCH regarding an accident report.

Unnecessary delays caused to customer due to poor process between teams.

Training to staff and joint working with SMBC to avoid in the future.

Officer absence meant delays for customer.

Cover is required for key and active cases.

Buddy system created and implemented.

Leak from above process.

When the tenant from the property where the suspected leak is coming from is not in, the job is closed (as no access), this means the issue continues.

Process changed to ensure jobs not closed until leak resolved.

Learning from Ombudsman Cases (Housing Ombudsman and Local Government Social Care Ombudsman)

What went wrong?

What did we learn?

What did we change?

Complaint handling failures.

Management of complaint investigation alongside daily duties meant timeliness and quality of response negatively impacted complaint handling.

Pilot for centralised complaint team, leading to review from SCHape Panel and implementation of new team.

Appropriate advice not provided to male victim of domestic abuse.

Every opportunity must be taken to support victims of domestic abuse.

Training has been undertaken.

Advice not given regarding removal from Housing Register and medical guidance used in isolation to confirm banding on Housing Register.

Our letter in this process did not clarify that the customer was no longer on the Housing Register.

Whilst medical advice is significant, all circumstances must be considered when awarding a banding.

Letter has been updated.

Team guidance has been updated.

We are committed to improving our service delivery and the learning we take from complaints is really valuable!