Student Complaints Procedure
Student Complaints Procedure
12.10 Procedural Introduction
12.10.1 Before making a complaint you should speak to the school or service that you would like to complain about. We also encourage you to seek advice from the Students’ Union Advice Centre and/or one of the Student Conciliators because they have experience of resolving complaints. We will try to resolve your concerns informally through conciliation. Conciliation is the informal consideration of your concerns with a view to finding a positive resolution. The process will depend on the nature of the concern you have raised.
12.10.2 The Students’ Union Advice Centre can provide you with independent advice and you can be supported by one of their advisers at any stage of the student complaints procedure.
12.10.3 There are deadlines within this procedure and we expect you to keep to these unless you have compelling independent evidence to show why you could not do this. We are also expected to meet our deadlines but there will occasionally be times when we are unable to do this for good reason. If so, we will let you know why and keep you informed of progress.
12.10.4 If you are complaining on behalf of a group of students you must attach a sheet to the student complaints form, containing the names of the students who form part of the group raising the complaint. You should ensure that the members of the group have agreed the content of the complaint and any supporting evidence that is sent to us. The investigator will send an email to all complainants to confirm the matter is being considered as a group complaint but will then liaise with the nominated student, put forward by the group. Any member of the group can withdraw from the complaint at any time.
12.11 Informal Resolution Stage
12.11.1 Before making a complaint you should speak to the school or service that you would like to complain about. This could be done by approaching the service administration team, your Supervisor or your School Guidance Team.
12.11.2 We will try to resolve your concerns informally through conciliation. Conciliation is the informal consideration of your concerns with a view to finding a positive resolution. The process will depend on the nature of the concern you have raised. If you would prefer to approach someone impartial in the first instance, The University have a number of trained student conciliators and you can discuss your complaint with them in confidence. They can help you decide the best way to resolve the problem and support you in doing that.
12.12 Stage 1: School-level Resolution
12.12.1 If you are unhappy with the informal resolution of your complaint, you should complete Stage 1 of the student complaints form. Please give us all the relevant details of your complaint, including any supporting evidence you would like to submit and tell us the outcome you would like in order to resolve your complaint.
12.12.2 You should make your complaint at Stage 1 as soon as possible and no later than one calendar month of the incident which has caused you to complain, unless you can provide compelling independent evidence which shows why you could not raise the complaint sooner. Please refer to 12.8 for expectations on the timings of complaints.
12.12.3 Where for good reason you are not able to engage with the procedure and you would like someone to complain on your behalf, you will need to provide us with your written authority by emailing us from your university email account to confirm who will be making the complaint.
12.12.4 You should send your completed student complaints form to your School Manager, these details are on the complaints form. The School Manager will review the complaint and pass it to the relevant person within the school or service who will investigate.
12.12.5 The staff member investigating your complaint, as part of their investigation, may seek other information such as email correspondence to help inform their investigation.
12.12.6 Normally this person will invite you to meet with them to discuss your complaint, this could be via email or face-to-face. That meeting will take place either via online means or face-to-face. The investigator will take a record of the meeting and include this with the response, along with copies of any other evidence considered.
12.12.7 You should receive a response, providing reasons for the outcome, no later than 20 working days of the date that we received your Stage 1 complaint.
12.12.8 If you are satisfied with the outcome to your complaint, you must inform the investigator of this in writing by email. If you accept the outcome to your complaint this will be in full and final settlement of all issues raised in your complaint.
12.13 Stage 2: University-level Resolution
12.13.1 If you are unhappy with the Stage 1 response you should complete Stage 2 of your student complaints form and submit all documentation related to the outcome of your Stage 1 complaint. You should ensure that Stage 1 also remains completed from the earlier stage of your complaint. You may wish to use your earlier form to do this.
12.13.2 You should email the completed student complaints form to Registry via studentcomplaints@hud.ac.uk no later than 10 working days of the date you were issued with the Stage 1 response. You can submit the updated student complaints form and then provide supporting documentation afterwards during the investigation. You should not submit the form late because you have been waiting for something.
12.13.3 As part of this stage, Registry will investigate your complaint and review whether the Stage 1 outcome was reasonable and whether the complaints procedure was followed correctly. If your complaint is about Registry we will ask a senior member of staff elsewhere within the University to investigate your complaint.
12.13.4 As part of our investigations we may ask to meet with you and other people involved in your complaint.
12.13.5 We will send you a written response providing reasons for the outcome no later than 20 working days of the date that we received your Stage 2 complaint.
12.13.6 If you are satisfied with the outcome to your complaint, you must inform the investigator of this in writing by email. If you accept the outcome to your complaint this will be in full and final settlement of all issues raised in your complaint.
12.14 Stage 3: Request for Review
12.14.1 If you are unhappy with the Stage 2 response you can request a review by emailing studentcomplaints@hud.ac.uk no later than 10 working days of the date you were issued with the Stage 2 outcome. You will need to explain why you are unhappy with the Stage 2 response and what the desired outcome is when requesting the review.
12.14.2 This stage will not be a new investigation of your complaint and you should not submit new arguments or evidence, unless you have a very good reason for doing so, which you can support with independent evidence. If you wish you to raise a new complaint or a new element of your complaint, you must raise a new stage 1 complaint in order for it to be investigated fully.
12.14.3 We will review your complaint to consider whether the student complaints procedure was followed correctly at Stages 1 and 2, and whether the outcome reached at the Stage 2 was reasonable.
12.14.4 Your Stage 3 request for review will be considered by a member of Registry staff who has not been involved in the previous stages of this procedure and their decision will be approved by a Pro Vice Chancellor. We will issue a Completion of Procedures letter, providing reasons for the outcome, no later than 20 working days from the date the review request was received.
12.14.5 For your Stage 3 request for review to be considered you must provide independent evidence where possible to demonstrate at least one of the following grounds:
- there was an irregularity in the way we considered your Stage 2 complaint;
- the decision we reached was unreasonable in light of the evidence provided for Stage 1 and 2;
- you have submitted new evidence that, for a good reason, could not have been provided at Stage 1 or 2 and would have materially affected the outcome.
12.14.6 If your complaint review is successful or partially successful, the following may be offered to you:
- A remedy offered at the earlier stages may be offered to you again;
- You may have a new remedy;
- it may be investigated again if there were procedural issues with the investigation into the complaint.
12.14.7 If your complaint review is not successful:
- You may wish to discuss the outcome with the SU Advice Centre who can independently guide you through the decision;
- You may request an independent review of the Stage 3 decision.
12.14.8 Your Stage 3 request for review will be considered by a member of Registry staff who has not been involved in the previous stages of this procedure and their decision will be approved by a Pro Vice Chancellor. We will issue a Completion of Procedures letter, providing reasons for the outcome, no later than 20 working days from the date the review request was received.
12.14.9 For your Stage 3 request for review to be considered you must provide independent evidence where possible to demonstrate at least one of the following grounds:
- there was an irregularity in the way we considered your Stage 2 complaint;
- the decision we reached was unreasonable in light of the evidence provided for Stage 1 and 2;
- you have submitted new evidence that, for a good reason, could not have been provided at Stage 1 or 2 and would have materially affected the outcome.
12.15 OIA: Independent review of student complaint outcome
12.15.1 You can request an independent review of our final Stage 3 decision. You will need to send your completion of procedures letter to the Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA) within 12 months of the date of the completion of procedures letter.