Child Support Agency (Hansard, 12 January 1999)

§ Angela Eagle

The administration of the Child Support Agency is a matter for the Chief Executive, Mrs. Faith Boardman. She will write to my hon. Friend.

Letter from Faith Boardman to Mr. Denis Murphy, dated 11 January 1999: I am replying to your Parliamentary Question to the Secretary of State for Social Security about Child Support Agency cases referred to the Independent Case Examiner. The Office of the Independent Case Examiner commenced work in April 1997. When the Agency responds to a complaint the client is provided with details on the services of the Independent Case Examiner to enable them to contact her directly. During the twelve month period to 30 November 1998, 1463 clients made applications to the Independent Case Examiner. Only about one third of applications received by the Independent Case Examiner result in a full investigation. There are a number of reasons for this; the required gateways for investigation may not be satisfied; or the case may fall outside the Independent Case Examiner's jurisdiction. Additionally an increasing number of complaints are resolved early following successful mediation, without the need for a full investigation. In the same period, the Independent Case Examiner issued 217 final reports following her investigation (some of these reports will relate to applications received prior to 1 December 1997 as the target for completion of a full investigation is 19 weeks). In 73 of these reports the complaint was fully upheld and in 132 the complaint was partially upheld. Of these 217 cases, 172 resulted in compensation being paid. Compensation payments are considered where a clear and unambiguous error by the Agency has resulted in distress or in actual financial loss to the client which is not recoverable through other means. We are committed to providing good quality customer service and are continuing to develop a close working relationship with the Independent Case Examiner and her staff, meeting regularly to identify ways in which our service to clients can be improved. This has led to the Agency's Business Units adopting a case study approach to cases handled by the Independent Case Examiner. This involves the Business Unit Manager and staff involved with the case identifying lessons learned, introducing improvements and good working practices and liaising with the office of the Independent Case Examiner. We have reviewed the way that we handle complaints and we have increased resources for our Client Helplines and the National Enquiry Line, extended our hours of opening to cover 8.00 am to 8.00 pm Monday to Friday and 9.00 am to 5.00 pm on Saturdays and completed trials to greatly improve and increase clients' opportunities to secure a face to face service. Through these measures our aim is to deal with clients' problems at an early stage and prevent problems escalating. I am confident that through closer liaison with the Independent Case Examiner and the action we have already taken we have started to address the problems we have in the way we deal with clients' complaints. Where we discover we have made mistakes or caused delay we will do everything in our power to put things right as quickly as possible and apologise to the clients concerned. I recognise that we have a long way to go to remedy our problems fully, but we expect clients to see continuous ongoing improvements by the end of 1998–99 and beyond. I hope this is helpful.