The Complaint Handling Code requires landlords to have a Member Responsible for Complaints (MRC) on their governing body to provide assurance to the governing body on the effectiveness of its complaints system, including challenging the data and information provided to the Board or equivalent body.
The expectation is that the MRC is responsible for ensuring that complaint handling drives service improvement for residents and learning and business improvement for the organisation.
The role of the MRC is to champion a positive complaint handling culture and build effective relationships with complaints teams, residents, it’s audit and risk committees as well wider teams and the Housing Ombudsman Service.
The MRC should be looking to seek assurances from the complaints team and where appropriate the operational teams that complaints are being managed, change is happening and that residents are being heard through the process.
The Ombudsman is looking to the MRC to promote a culture of openness and transparency in relation to complaints made by residents. To provide assurance that systems are in place to capture learning from complaints, that governing bodies are engaged with this and to ensure senior level ownership of learning and accountability stemming from complaints.
It is vital the MRC alerts the governing body of any concerns they have about the handling of complaints, the substantive issues giving rise to complaints, to ensure the whole governing body understands its responsibilities to deliver a positive complaint handling culture and that to make sure complaints are given the status they deserve within the senior leadership’s work.
The Housing Ombudsman's Centre for Learning spoke to Andrea Keenoy, Chief Operating Officer at the Housing Ombudsman, about the role and the impact it can have on organisations.
The MRC is responsible for creating a culture where senior management regularly review issues and trends arising from complaint handling with themes or trends being assessed and reported to the governing body, which identify potential systemic issues, serious risks or policies and procedures that require revision.
The role should encourage a culture of effective cross-organisational and cross-department learning where operational teams collaborate with each other to produce improved service delivery.
To find out more, please take a look at the videos below.