Mrs L and her husband had been registered with their GP for over 15 years. While she and her husband were waiting for their flu jabs, Mrs L became involved in a disagreement with Practice staff about unanswered telephone calls. After the incident Mr L wrote to the Practice to complain about the practice manager’s attitude to his wife and to ask for an apology. He said the practice manager had twice said he would ‘get you [Mrs L] struck off for this’.

Mrs L then received a letter from her GP saying that she had been abusive and used strong language. This had ‘intimidated’ and ‘humiliated’ Practice staff, who asked the GP to get Mr and Mrs L removed from the patient list. The GP suggested to Mrs L that the situation might be retrieved if she apologised to the practice manager.

Mrs L wrote back ‘shocked and horrified’ by the letter, saying ‘never before have I had a cross word with anyone in your practice’. She was particularly upset by the threat to remove her husband and did not see why he should be penalised for what had happened. Mrs L said she was happy to meet the practice manager, but refused to apologise. The practice manager then sent Mrs L a letter signed on behalf of the senior partner, informing her that she was being removed from the list. (Mr L left the Practice of his own accord.) Mrs L then escalated her complaint to Stockport Primary Care Trust (the Trust), which made enquiries of the Practice and agreed with their actions.

Upset about being removed from the list because of a ‘simple disagreement’, Mrs L came to the Ombudsman. She said she had ‘been made to feel like a criminal of some sort’, and that the Trust had simply sided with the Practice.

Our investigation showed that the Practice had removed Mrs L without warning and had not followed their own zero tolerance policy. On top of that, the removal letter was signed by the practice manager, the very person Mrs L had complained about. The Practice also failed to deal with all of Mr and Mrs L’s complaints. For their part, the Trust did not check if the Practice had followed the rules or their own policies and they did not fully respond to her complaint. They missed the opportunity to ask the Practice to put things right.

The Practice and the Trust each apologised to Mr and Mrs L and paid them compensation totalling £750. The Practice appointed a new complaints manager and updated their guidance on removing patients. The Trust also revised their policies on removing patients, to prevent a recurrence of their failings.