Action plans

An action plan should describe what has been done to learn lessons after things went wrong and what will be done to prevent the same mistake from happening again.

• Good practice in complaint handling
  • Investigating complaints
  • Formal responses to complaints
  • Making an apology
  • Action plans
  • Sharing learning from complaints
• Complaint handling in the new NHS
• Understanding what it means to be an NHS provider
• Getting it right: our work in the new NHS

A good action plan will:

• say what went wrong in the service provided, and identify the cause of the problem;
• explain what action, targeted at the cause of the problem, will be taken to stop it happening again and who will be responsible for ensuring this happens;
• give timescales for when that action took place or will take place;
• where possible, provide objective evidence of those actions; and
• explain how the organisation will check that these actions have been taken, and are working – and when this will be done, and by whom.