About us
We are the final stage for complaints about the NHS in England and public services delivered by the UK Government. We look into complaints where someone believes there has been injustice or hardship because an organisation has not acted properly or fairly or has given a poor service and not put things right.
Our service is free for everyone.
About the role
The Ombudsman is seeking to establish a panel of ‘expert advisors' who can support PHSO in our journey to becoming an exemplary ombudsman service as set out in our 2018-21 corporate strategy. The purpose of the panel will be to offer the Ombudsman and PHSO expert challenge and support where the Ombudsman identifies this would be useful.
In this role, members of the panel may be invited to participate in individual projects or pieces of work that are being delivered across PHSO. This could include a range of activity, from sitting on reviews into elements of the Ombudsman’s service to reviewing materials we produce to make sure they are fit for purpose.
We are yet to determine the precise areas of work that we would seek to involve panel members, but examples of the type of activity this could include are:
- Improving our service: we already generate a significant amount of data about our performance through our published Service Charter. ‘Deeper dives’ into batches of service complaints, which would not involve reviewing individual case decisions but the process we have followed, could be a useful addition to our approach, however, and we are currently exploring this. Panel members with significant and senior experience of the complaints system and/or advocacy sector, complaint handling itself or conducting independent reviews could help us either develop our approach or take part in the ‘dives’ depending on the model devised. We expect this to provide insight into the quality of the service we have provided on a number of different complaints we have considered and how this could be improved in future through changes to policy, practise or guidance to staff involved in casework.
- New methods of investigation: We are committed by 2020/21 to identifying additional approaches to investigation (eg early resolution and mediation) to incorporate into our service. Panel members with expertise in different methods of health investigation and/or complaint handling techniques or the complainant experience could play a role in helping us identify the utility of the new approaches to our service.
How to apply
Your application should be in the form of cv & a supporting statement. Applications should be submitted via our e –recruitment site no later than 10am on Monday 15th July.