Saturday 27 April 2013

How to raise a complaint - an update


Some of you have asked how to make a complaint to Regenter B3 – whether this be on a day to day basis or something more substantial. We have previously provided a guide on this, but given that so many people at Regenter B3 have left, we thought it would be worthwhile updating it. 

One lesson many of us have learned is that making representations in person at the housing office or on the phone is not necessarily effective. Often are complaints ‘lost’ or ‘forgotten’. 

It is far better to put complaints in writing, either by email to Suzanne Ste-Croix (leasehold services manager) at suzanne.ste-croix@pinnacle-psg.com or to the housing office at 111 Endwell Road, Brockley, London SE4 2PE (though the benefit of email is that you can confirm receipt, and is of course quicker).

If your complaint is not dealt with, you should raise it as a ‘Stage 1 complaint' to Pinnacle. You then have 10 working days for them to send a response. This invokes the formal complaint procedure and should (in theory) be logged and then be reflected on Regenter B3’s (not very good) performance statistics. 

Failing that resolving the issue, you should then write to or email the Director of Housing at Lewisham Council (Genevieve Macklin - genevieve.macklin@lewisham.gov.uk) entitled 'Stage 2 complaint'. A Stage 3 complaint should be referred to Lewisham's independent adjudicator if this fails to resolve your complaint. 

The other benefit of keeping things in writing is to ensure there is a full audit record, which can prove invaluable. 

Some of you will be aware that the utterly-feckless Alwyn Lewis has left Brockley to work on another PFI arrangement. Tapiwa Jiya and Jim Duke have also left.