Complaints

The Complaints Policy helps underpin the mission statement of Maldon Primary School (“the School”). Its aim is to ensure that a concern, difficulty or complaint is managed sympathetically, efficiently and at the appropriate level and resolved as soon as possible. Doing so is good practice, fair to those concerned and helps to promote parents’ and students’ confidence in the School’s ability to safeguard and promote welfare. The School will try to resolve every concern, difficulty or complaint in a positive way with the aim of putting right a matter which may have gone wrong and, where necessary, reviewing the School’s systems and procedures in the light of the matters raised.

The School needs to know as soon as possible if there is any cause for dissatisfaction. The School recognises that a concern or difficulty which is not resolved quickly and fairly can soon become a cause of resentment, which can be damaging to the relationship between the School and the parent and student, and can also have a detrimental effect upon the School’s ethos and culture. Parents and students should never feel – or be made to feel – that raising a concern, difficulty or complaint will adversely affect the student’s future at the School, or place the student at a disadvantage in any way.

The School’s complaints procedure consists of four stages:

• Stage 1 – Concerns and difficulties, dealt with informally;

• Stage 2 – Complaints formally investigated by the Headteacher (or designate);

• Stage 3 – Complaints formally reviewed by the Chair of Local Governors (or designate);

• Stage 4 – Complaint Panel Hearing.