Complaints, care concerns and safeguarding

1. If someone is in immediate danger

Do not wait for a reply from us.

• Call 999 if a crime is in progress or someone is in immediate danger.
• Contact the police if you believe a crime has been committed.
• Contact the local council’s adult safeguarding team if an adult may be at risk of abuse or neglect, including where the concern is about treatment in a care home.

GOV.UK explains how to raise a safeguarding concern at gov.uk/report-abuse-of-older-person.

2. A complaint about us

Come to us about:

• how the website, your account or the enquiry service worked;
• something our team said or did;
• a payment or a provider membership;
• how we handled a listing correction or a provider’s submission of a listing;
• accessibility; or
• anything else about our own service.

• Email: hello@lookingforcare.co.uk
• Post: Complaints, Looking Global Limited, Summer Shaw, Cudham Lane North, Cudham, Sevenoaks, TN14 7QR

It helps if you tell us:

• your name and how you would like us to reply;
• what happened and when;
• the page, account, home or payment involved;
• what you would like us to do; and
• any screenshots or correspondence that would help.

Please do not email medical records, identity documents or card details. If we need a document, we will tell you a secure way to send it.

3. How we handle a complaint about us

We will normally:

1. acknowledge your complaint within 3 working days;
2. give it to someone who was not directly responsible for what happened, where that is practicable;
3. investigate fairly, looking at the relevant records and asking you for anything else we need;
4. give you a written outcome within 20 working days; and
5. explain what we are doing about it, or why we cannot do what you have asked.

If a complaint is complex and will take longer, we will tell you why and give you a new date.

If you are not satisfied with our answer, ask for a review within 20 working days of it. A director will look again at the complaint and at the way it was handled, and will normally reply within a further 20 working days. We are a small company, so we will tell you honestly if that is the same person who answered you first. They will still take a fresh look, and if you remain unsatisfied the routes in this section stay open to you.

We may vary this process where urgent action is needed, where legal proceedings are under way, where another body has jurisdiction, or where contact has become abusive or threatening. We will not restrict contact simply because someone is persistent about a genuine unresolved concern.

We are not a member of an alternative dispute resolution scheme, and no ombudsman has jurisdiction over our platform service. If our review does not resolve matters, you remain free to take the matter to court.

4. A complaint about a care home

If your complaint is about the care, the fees, the contract, the staff or the conduct of a listed home, we are not the right first port of call. Take these steps:

1. ask the home or its provider for a copy of its complaints procedure, and use it;
2. if a council or an NHS body arranged or funded the placement, raise it with them as well;
3. tell the Care Quality Commission about poor care, so that it can use the information in its regulatory work; and
4. if the provider’s own process has not resolved an adult social care complaint in England, take it to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.

• CQC: how to complain about a service
• Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman: lgo.org.uk

The CQC uses what you tell it to regulate services, but it does not usually resolve an individual complaint for you. The Ombudsman will normally expect the provider to have had a fair chance to respond first.

We can correct a listing and, where it is warranted, restrict a provider’s account. We cannot investigate clinical care, award compensation, decide a dispute about a placement, or stand in for a provider’s statutory complaints process.

5. Information on a listing that is wrong

Use “Report incorrect information” on the home’s profile, or write to hello@lookingforcare.co.uk. Tell us:

• which home and which page;
• the statement you believe is wrong;
• what the correct information is, and where it comes from; and
• whether you think it creates an urgent safety risk.

We may check the report against CQC or public records, ask the listing manager for evidence, mark the information as disputed, correct it, or remove provider-supplied content. We do not change an official CQC rating because someone disagrees with it.

6. Privacy and data protection

Write to hello@lookingforcare.co.uk about a concern regarding personal information, or to exercise a right under data protection law. Our privacy notice explains those rights in full.

You may also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint or on 0303 123 1113.

7. Billing

For a question about a charge, write to hello@lookingforcare.co.uk with the organisation, the home, the invoice date and the last four digits of the card as shown in your billing portal. Never send the full card number or the security code.

We investigate duplicate, unauthorised and incorrect charges promptly, and we refund anything we charged in error: clause 9.5 of the provider business terms says so expressly. A voluntary cancellation is different, because the membership runs to the end of the period paid for and the service is delivered in full, so no refund arises.

8. Confidentiality and records

We handle what you tell us on a need-to-know basis. We may share it with the home, provider, supplier, adviser, insurer, regulator or authority concerned where that is necessary and lawful. We may not be able to keep something confidential where a person is at risk or where the law requires disclosure.

Making a complaint will not affect your access to the service, unless restricting it is reasonably necessary for security or safety.