• You must give them a chance to put things right before complaining to us

• You should go through all stages of their complaints procedure

See our Top tips for making a complaint

• If your problem has not been put right

• If you have not had a response within a reasonable time. This should usually be within 12 weeks but may be longer for social care complaints that follow a statutory process

See more detail on how to complain to us

In most cases, we cannot investigate if you have not:

• complained to us within 12 months of becoming aware of the matter

• been directly affected by the matter - we call this 'personal injustice'

• We will take a first look at your complaint and advise on the next steps 

• Then we will assess whether we can and should investigate

• If we investigate, we may ask you and the organisation for more information 

• We publish our final decisions on our website. We don’t use real names