Below is a list of details which may be of assistance to you
in formulating your complaint.
Name the person or organisation against whom the complaint is lodged.
Is the person or organisation you are complaining about a current member
of
BACP?
Check your complaint against the timescale at 1.5 of the Professional
Conduct Procedure.
Have legal proceedings been issued or contemplated regarding
the matters forming the subject matter of the complaint? If yes, please
contact the Professional
Conduct Department as this may prohibit your complaint being processed at
this time.
Give details of how you have tried to resolve the matter with the
practitioner, i.e. through direct contact, using mediation (or other service)
or through
any internal complaints procedure. If no attempt has been made to resolve
the matter, give an explanation as to why this has not been possible.
Copies of any correspondence relating to this matter should be attached
to your
complaint.
Provide exact details of events that are the subject matter
of the complaint, including times, dates and places supported by as much
evidence
as possible.
It is useful to open with a summary of the situation before going
into the exact details of your complaint.
Witness statements could provide
evidence of the occurrence of events.
Evidence could be supplied in the
form of documents, contemporaneous notes, pre-counselling or pre-training
literature, diary entries, advertising material and correspondence etc.
Where evidence is supplied, it should be attached to the complaint as appendices and clearly referenced in the
body of the complaint.
Please ensure, wherever possible, that your submission
is written on one side of each sheet of paper only to assist in the reproduction
of the submission.
Wherever possible, please avoid using colour.
A copy of the submitted complaint
will be seen by the member complained against. Therefore, you must be aware
of what contact details you include in
the complaint submission. If you do not wish the member complained against
to have sight of your personal details or that of third parties, please exclude
them from your submission, but your contact details must be included in the
covering letter to BACP.
The complaint should be signed and dated.
If you need to obtain further guidance on the presentation of your complaint,
or some of the checklist questions require explanation, please call the
Professional Conduct Department on 0870 443 5216 where a member of staff
will be available
to speak to you. While staff can speak about the presentation of the complaint,
they are not able to advise on either the contents or merits of the complaint.
