Share Your Feedback: Compliments, Complaints and Comments

We welcome compliments, comments and complaints because your feedback helps us recognise what we are doing well, improve where needed, and respond to the concerns fairly and openly.

We will ensure that you are able to:

• share feedback easily,
• tell us when we have done something well,
• raise a concern or make a complaint with confidence,
• feel listened to and understood,
• know that issues will be addressed fairly, efficiently and in a timely way, and
• see how your feedback helps us improve our services.

How to submit your feedback

You can give your feedback to a member of our team in person. Depending on the situation, they may be able to help you immediately. Or, you can give us your feedback in one of the following ways:

• Post: Gilgal Birmingham, 196-198 Edward Road, Birmingham, B12 9LX
• Email: feedback@gilgalbham.org.uk
• Phone: speak to a member of our team on 0800 008 6622
• Website: complete the short form below

Compliments and comments will be processed and acknowledged within 20 working days of receiving it.

How we handle complaints

A complaint is an expression of dissatisfaction. It can be about the standard of a service we provide, or actions we have or have not taken. We want to know when there is dissatisfaction with our services so that we can improve, put things right, and where necessary, adjust the way we work.

We will acknowledge your complaint within 5 working days and provide a response within 10 working days of receiving it.

Whilst we expect to resolve most complaints within 10 working days, if we need more time to investigate the matter, we will aim to provide you with a response within 20 working days. If we are unable to meet this deadline due to exceptional circumstances, we will inform you.

If you are not happy with the response you receive, you have a right to appeal within 5 working days. We will tell you how to do this in our response.

Anonymous complaints will be recorded and investigated as far as possible and formally recorded.

There are some circumstances where the matter will not be considered as a complaint or escalated. These are where:

• it is a disagreement or dispute about another service user,
• it is a service request (e.g. maintenance or repair),
• the matter or issue occurred over 12 months ago,
• legal proceedings have started, or
• they have previously been considered under our complaints procedure.

We will respond with an explanation of why are not able to process a complaint and any rights you may have to pursue this issue through another route.

Further support

Gilgal is a member of Women’s Aid, a federation of specialist domestic abuse services across England. This means that we are covered by the Women’s Aid Membership Complaints Policy and Procedure and individuals may raise a complaint to Women’s Aid about our organisation under certain circumstances. For more information about Women’s Aid and their complaints policy, visit their website here.

We are also registered with The Fundraising Regulator and have signed up to their Fundraising Promise. This means that we are committed to ensuring our fundraising is legal, open, honest and respectful, and in line with the Code of Fundraising Practice – the UK’s charitable fundraising standards. The Fundraising Regulator may be able to investigate complaints about Gilgal’s fundraising activities where these cannot be resolved by us. ​For more details on how you may be able to escalate your complaint, visit their website here.