The Forces Employment Charity strives for high standards in service delivery. We welcome feedback from individuals, users of our services, stakeholders, funding bodies and anyone who works with us on all our services. Such feedback is invaluable for evaluating and improving our work.
The objectives of the Forces Employment Charity complaints policy and procedures are to:
The Forces Employment Charity will ensure that we:
This policy now explicitly aligns with best‑practice charity governance guidance, including Charity Commission expectations for transparency, accountability and accessible complaints routes.
The policy reflects sector best practice, emphasising that complaints procedures must be simple, visible, and easy to use, as outlined in the Fundraising Regulator’s guidance and the Charity Commission’s research.
A complaint is any expression of dissatisfaction by an individual, whether justified or not.
An individual may make a complaint if they feel the Forces Employment Charity has:
This policy relates only to complaints about the Forces Employment Charity and its services.
This Complaints Policy is for external complaints from clients, supporters, partners, or the public.
Anonymous complaints will be accepted and investigated in proportion to the number of complaints. Complaints from vulnerable people will be handled with additional care, support and safeguarding awareness.
Vexatious or repeated complaints will be managed under a separate protocol to ensure fairness while protecting staff time and wellbeing.
Establishing the difference between a concern and a complaint is essential. Taking informal concerns seriously at the earliest stage will reduce the likelihood that they will develop into formal complaints.
If you have any concerns about our work, please tell a Forces Employment Charity employee or their manager as soon as possible so they can quickly understand your concerns and try to put things right.
If you are unhappy with the response to your concern and want to make a formal complaint, please follow the procedure below.
Where it is unclear whether an issue is a concern or a complaint, the best practice is to treat it as a complaint to ensure the individual is heard and responded to appropriately.
The Forces Employment Charity aims to settle many complaints quickly and satisfactorily by the member of staff who provides the service. The complaint may be resolved quickly through an apology or an acceptable explanation to the individual.
An accessible ‘How to Complain’ summary will be published on our website, ensuring the process is highly visible and easy for all users, in line with Fundraising Regulator requirements.
There are two stages to the complaint procedure:
Complaints can be made in the following ways:
All complaints should be submitted to Sandra Williamson, Head of Compliance.
Once the complaint has been recorded, we will acknowledge receipt to the individual within two working days.
An investigation will be launched within two working days of receiving the complaint. The Forces Employment Charity Senior Management Team will request internal information from staff and from systems to understand the circumstances surrounding the complaint.
Information may also be requested from external sources, such as individuals in partner organisations.
We will treat the complaint with sensitivity, discretion and understanding and conduct our investigation accordingly.
The Head of Compliance will aim to complete the investigation within five working days of receipt of the complaint and will determine and implement remedial action where appropriate. The Compliance Team will respond to the individual making the complaint and let them know the outcome of the investigation and the action taken.
If the investigation takes longer than five working days, we will inform the individual making the complaint of an estimate of the investigation’s duration. We will then respond and resolve the issue as above.
Once the investigation is complete, the resolution is determined, and the individual who has received the complaint has received the response, the complaint will be closed. All associated documentation is recorded in the Complaint Reference Folder within the Complaint Team on Microsoft Teams.
Once the investigation is complete, the resolution is determined, and the individual who has received the complaint has received the response, the complaint will be closed. Any learning and development opportunities identified from the complaint investigation will be implemented as standard.
If the complainant is not satisfied with the resolution offered, they can appeal. Appeal requests should be made to the Head of Compliance at [email protected]
To process a complaint, the Forces Employment Charity will hold personal data about the complainant, including information the individual provides, and information others provide in response to the complaint. The Forces Employment Charity will hold this data securely and only use it to address the complaint. The identity of the person making the complaint will be known only to those who need to consider it and will not be revealed to others or made public by the Forces Employment Charity. However, it may not be possible to preserve confidentiality in some circumstances, for example, where relevant legislation applies, or allegations involving third parties’ conduct are made.
The Forces Employment Charity will usually securely destroy complaint files six years after the complaint is closed.
This policy is reviewed annually, and amendments will be made.
Reviewed April 2026
Head of Compliance
