Making a complaint

It’s easier and quicker to first raise a complaint directly with the service involved. You should speak to a member of staff as soon as possible before making a formal complaint.

The formal complaint process

• Let us know your complaint.
• We acknowledge your complaint within three working days and let you know who is dealing with it.
• We discuss the complaint with you to try and understand why you are not happy and what you want to happen after. We will agree a timescale.

Contact Details: Complaints.SOCS@leeds.gov.uk 

Sometimes we don’t get things right first time or you might feel that we could have given you a better service. If we have got something wrong or you are unhappy about something then we want you to tell us. 

If you are not happy with the support that you or someone you are close to is receiving it is your right to complain. This gives us the opportunity to make changes and to try and put things right. We will always take your complaint seriously and we are committed to resolving complaints with you. 

First of all, if you feel comfortable doing so, you should tell the people providing the service about your concerns so they have a chance to put things right. For example, if you are unhappy with the service you have received speak to a supervisor or manager if you can. 

The quickest and easiest way to make a complaint is by using our feedback form. If you are complaining on behalf of a child please include their name and date of birth in the enquiry details.

You can use generative AI (for example, ChatGPT) to help you write your complaint. But AI can sometimes be wrong, unclear, or include information that is not relevant. We understand your complaint best when it is written clearly and briefly in your own words. If you use AI, please check that what you send is relevant, accurate, and as short as possible. If AI-written text makes your complaint hard to understand, we may decide what information we will use as part of our investigation. If you need support (e.g. language access or accessibility) we will provide human assistance —just let us know.

It’s important to remember that schools are self-governing bodies. This means they have their own policies and procedures, and they should follow them. If you remain unhappy, the policy will explain how to escalate your complaint—Leeds City Council is not an escalation route for school complaints.

The school’s complaints policy should be available on its website. If you cannot find it online, you can ask the school for a paper copy.

Parentkind, in partnership with the Department for Education and Ofsted, has produced a helpful resource to support you to raise concerns and resolve issues with your school quickly, positively and effectively. It also includes practical tips on how to raise a complaint well if you need to.

V8- Parent Complaint Guide.

The guide also sets out how schools and parents can work together to resolve problems early, without needing to make a formal complaint. It may help to read the Parentkind advice before deciding what to do next.

Leeds City Council have a series of promises that we make to all young people in care.

The promise

We promise to:

• help and support you to stay safe and have a healthy lifestyle.
• involve you in all decisions about your life.
• have high aspirations for you and encourage you to reach your full potential.
• support you throughout your education and to plan for the future.
• listen and make sure you know what will happen next.
• celebrate your achievements.
• make sure you have lots of different people to support you.
• help you have new experiences and develop your own interests.
• We developed these promises with the Have a Voice Council – a group of young people in care in Leeds who work to improve how we look after you.
• Your social worker should have already shared the promise card with you and helped you to understand it. If they haven't done this or you want to know more, please ask them.

Let us know if we’re keeping our promises

We want you to tell us how we're doing at keeping our promises to you. Let us know if:

• we have not kept any of our promises to you
• you’re unhappy with the support we’ve given you
• someone has worked hard to support you and you think they should be recognised and praised

Contact details: 

• Email: telluswecare@leeds.gov.uk 
• Tel: 0113 378 5111