Term
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Definitions
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Complainant
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A person, organisation or their representative/advocate making a customer complaint.
A complainant is a ‘customer’ for the purposes of the customer complaints management framework if they are directly affected by the issue they are complaining about (e.g. a student complaining about something that has happened to them at school), or they are authorised representative of someone who has been directly affected (e.g. a parent complaining on behalf of their child).
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Complaints officer
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A complaints officer is a departmental employee who is involved in managing customer complaints. Complaints officers may work in schools, regions or divisions. Their functions may include, but are not limited to, intake, assessment, management, resolution, and data entry. The management of a customer complaint may involve one or more complaints officers.
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Complaints requiring further action
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A reporting status applied when the complaint is closed. This is used in departmental reporting. Customer complaints will require further action if the complaint:
- is subject to internal review;
- has resulted in changes to departmental policies, procedures or practices; or
- is subject to an external review (e.g. by the Queensland Ombudsman or Queensland Human Rights Commission).
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Complaints requiring no further action
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A reporting status applied when the complaint is closed. This is used in departmental reporting. Customer complaints require no further action if the department has resolved/finalised the complaint at the point of service and there is no request for further action by the complainant or others (e.g. Queensland Ombudsman or Queensland Human Rights Commission).
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Customer complaint
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A customer complaint is defined in section 219(4) of the Public Service Act 2008 as a complaint about the service or action of a department, or its staff, by a person who is directly affected by the service or action. Examples may include complaints about:
- a decision made, or failure to make a decision, by a departmental employee
- an act, or failure to act, by the department
- the formulation of a proposal or intention by the department
- the making of a recommendation by the department
- the customer service provided by a departmental employee.
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Days
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Depending on the nature of the complaint and the area managing the complaint, customer complaints will be managed within either working days (i.e. business days) or school days (i.e. days during the school term).
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External review
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A process conducted by an external review body (e.g. Queensland Ombudsman or Queensland Human Rights Commission) to ensure departmental decision-making is fair, reasonable and proper.
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Frivolous complaint
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A frivolous complaint is one that is trivial or meritless in nature, and does not justify the resources that would be required to action it.
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Internal review
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A process conducted by appropriately trained departmental staff on request from the complainant which examines if the complaint management process for the original customer complaint was appropriate and/or if the outcome reached was reasonable. An internal review is not a re-investigation of the original customer complaint.
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Internal review officer
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An internal review officer is a departmental employee who conducts an internal review. The officer must be:
- independent from the original customer complaint; and
- in a position equal to, or higher than, the original decision-maker and authorised to make internal review decisions (including recommendations), or nominated by such a person.
Internal review officers will be regional or divisional staff. An internal review may involve more than one internal review officer.
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Involved in managing the original customer complaint
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To ensure independence, an internal review officer must not have been involved in managing the original customer complaint. Examples of ‘involvement’ include:
- providing advice on how the original customer complaint should be handled or complaint findings
- gathering information or evidence, or conducting interviews
- providing a complaint outcome.
If an internal review officer has general awareness of a customer complaint, this does not constitute being ‘involved’ in the original complaint handling process. In these situations, the internal review officer can undertake the internal review without compromising the independence of the process. Examples of general awareness include:
- overhearing staff talking about the customer complaint
- taking a phone message about the complaint
- reading a file note
- briefly discussing a complaint (e.g. at a team meeting).
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Procedural fairness
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Providing any party who may be affected by an internal review with a fair hearing and a reasonable opportunity to respond to any claims. Procedural fairness is also known as natural justice.
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Protected information
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Very sensitive and confidential information, where unauthorised and/or premature disclosure might cause damage to one or more parties. Refer to the Information security procedure for more information.
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Register
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A tool used to capture and record customer complaints data, including information about the complainant, their complaint, how the department has resolved the matter, and any reviews undertaken.
The Customer Complaints Management System (CCMS) is the department’s enterprise system for recording, assessing, managing, resolving and reporting on customer complaints. The CCMS should be used as the register for regional and divisional customer complaints.
Schools can record complaints in a school system or use a local register.
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Reporting status
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An assessment of the customer complaint completed at the point of resolution which identifies if the complaint requires no further action, or requires further action.
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Unreasonable complainant conduct
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Conduct is likely to be unreasonable where it involves actions or behaviours which because of the nature or frequency, raises substantial health, safety, wellbeing, resource or equity issues for the department, its staff, other service users or the complainant themselves. Examples include:
unrelenting contact (e.g. excessive and unnecessary phone calls or emails)
- demanding conduct (e.g. demanding more reviews than departmental procedures allow, or demanding a different outcome without showing the original decision was incorrect)
- unreasonable lack of cooperation (e.g. refusing to identify the issue of complaint or providing disorganised information)
- unreasonable arguments (e.g. making irrational claims)
- unreasonable behaviour (e.g. aggression or violence to staff, or threatening harm to self and others).
The Managing unreasonable complainant conduct procedure provides more information.
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Vexatious complaint
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A vexatious complaint is a complaint that is not brought in good faith, and is instead designed to harass, annoy, or create a resource burden for the department.
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