Posted: Wednesday 11 January 2012
Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary complaints recording “essentially sound”, according to PCCS audit
Following an audit of complaint recording practices at Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary, Professor John McNeill, the Police Complaints Commissioner for Scotland has awarded the force a rating of "Substantial Assurance".
The rating is the second highest available and reflects the audit finding that the initial recording of complaints within Dumfries and Galloway was considered to be generally robust. In his report the Commissioner found that the lack of a corporate, detailed approach to the handling of general correspondence to be a weakness, as there is no audit process in place.
The PCCS audit was carried out during November last year and looked at correspondence , emails and incident logs from stations at Castle Douglas, Stranraer, Dumfries, the HQ mail room, Force Executive, Fixed Penalty Unit and the Safety Camera Unit.
From 510 records examined, three were found to be complaints that had not been identified by the force, representing a non-recording level of less than 1% (0.6%), well within the 3% accuracy level set by the PCCS for this audit of initial complaint recording.
DCC McCormick from Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary said: " We acknowledge and welcome the findings of the PCCS report together with the recommendations made which are designed to improve on what was found to be, an essentially robust practice in capturing complaints made about our staff or the quality of service that we provide to the community we serve. A review of our mail handling system to identify any practice that could bring about improvements to that process is already underway."
The first instance of non-recording was found at Castle Douglas and involved an email complaining about action taken by the police and a failure to update the complainer regarding a separate matter. The complaint was responded to by letter by the force, but was not recorded as a complaint about the police.
The two further instances of non-recording found during the audit involved letters that were received at the force HQ in Dumfries. One was a letter complaining about comments made by an officer which was recorded within a miscellaneous File and the other letter was from a member of the public complaining about the police following his arrest. This complaint was subsequently dealt with appropriately and he was given an apology, which was accepted. However, the complaint was not recorded by the force.
Professor john McNeill said: "The audit did not find significant areas of weakness but improvements could be made to the way the force handles general correspondence. I am pleased that the force is acting on my recommendation and undertaking a review of the way it handles general correspondence. Improvements in this area will help to provide assurance to the public that, if they have a complaint about the police in Dumfries and Galloway, it will be identified, recorded and actioned."
Follow this link to read the full report.