Unhappy with our service?

If you are unhappy with the service you received from the Consumer Council, you can complain to us within six months of receiving your full investigation outcome or within six months of the issue occurring. If possible, wait until we have finished fully investigating your initial complaint before complaining about our service, so we can review the entirety of your case.

You could complain about us if:

• We do not deliver a service on time
• We give you the wrong information
• You receive a poor standard of customer care.

Our complaints procedure doesn’t cover:

• your disagreement with our decision on your complaint (complaining about our service is not likely to alter the investigation outcome)
• the evidence we looked at in reaching that decision
• the failure of your service provider to implement the remedy.

We offer a 2-step internal complaint escalation process.

By following the steps below, you provide us with the opportunity to resolve your complaint as early as possible.

Step 1: Tell us

If you are unhappy with the service you received/are receiving, please inform us so we can put things right. You can do this by either contacting the Investigating Officer directly or contacting the Protection Team Supervisor by email, phone or in writing.

• email: contact@consumercouncil.org.uk, FAO Protection Team Supervisor
• phone: 0800 121 6022 or 028 9025 1600 and ask to speak to the Protection Team Supervisor. If they aren't available, they'll come back to you as soon as possible
• letter: Complaints, Freepost, Consumer Council, BT2 8EN, FAO Protection Team Supervisor

Step 2: Raise a formal complaint with our Chief Executive

If you remain unhappy following correspondence with the Protection Team Supervisor and the issue is unresolved, please contact our Chief Executive Officer and a full and formal investigation of your entire case will be undertaken.

You can contact the Chief Executive Officer by email or in writing:

• email: CEOcomplaints@consumercouncil.org.uk
• letter: CEO, Freepost, Consumer Council, BT2 8EN

If you have difficulty communicating your complaint to us in writing, please contact us on 0800 121 6022 or 028 9025 1600 and we will be happy to assist you. We will take the details of your formal complaint and send you a copy by post. We will ask you to sign and return this to us to ensure that we have fully and accurately recorded all your concerns.

Please ensure, where possible, your case reference number is included in all correspondence.

When you make a formal complaint, we will:

• acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 3 working days and record it on our database
• undertake investigation of the case, provide an initial response within 10 working days, and update you on the progress of our investigation, indicating the likely timescale in which it will be completed

• we may need to contact you during the investigation for more information or clarification

  We will send you a detailed response when we complete our investigations.

If you still feel we have not dealt with your complaint correctly, you can refer your complaint to the Northern Ireland Public Services Ombudsman. 

• Freephone: 0800 34 34 24
• Email: nipso@nipso.org.uk
• Freepost: Freepost NIPSO

We understand that complaints can be unsettling and customers who contact us may be angry, upset, or disappointed. We will always do our best to help.

We also have a duty of care to our employees and ask that users of our service are polite to our colleagues. We will not tolerate abuse of our people or our service, aggression, or vexatious conduct.

Read our Unreasonable Behaviour Policy.