Why we exist
We were set up by Parliament nearly 50 years ago to help both individuals and the general public.
We are not part of government or the NHS; our role is to investigate complaints that individuals have been treated unfairly or have received poor service from government departments and other public organisations and the NHS in England. We do this fairly and without taking sides. We ask people to complain to the organisation they are unhappy about before bringing their complaint to us.
Our powers are set out in law and our service is free for everyone. The law gives us the power to investigate and make the final decision on complaints about public services for individuals. We make recommendations on how mistakes can be put right and can ask organisations to produce action plans to show how they will implement them. If our investigations find big or repeated mistakes, we share this information with regulators to help them do their job.
We share information about our work with Parliament to help them hold government and the NHS in England to account for the service they provide and the way they handle complaints.
Over the next five years, we will carry out our role by:
- investigating complaints fairly and without taking sides;
- making the final decision on complaints about public services for individuals;
- using what we learn from complaints to help others make public services better; and
- leading the way in making it easier to complain about public services and to help public services resolve complaints better.
