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<p>The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) received 533 complaints about
their service in the financial year 2015-16. This represents 1.3% of CICA’s live caseload.
49% of complaints were closed within 10 days.</p><p> </p><p>Where complaints took
longer to close this was due to the number of enquiries required to fully investigate
the complaint. In other cases, CICA were asked by the complainer not to close the
complaint until a final decision was issued on the claim. The average time CICA took
to deal with those complaints was 23.75 days.</p><p> </p><p>The most common complaint
received by CICA related to delays in finalising claims. CICA aims to make compensation
payments as quickly as possible, however, they have a duty to the taxpayer to fully
investigate claims to make sure that the applicant gets the level of compensation
they deserve.</p><p> </p><p>The 10 most common reasons for complaining about CICA’s
service in 2015/16 were:</p><table><tbody><tr><td><p><strong>Reason given for complaint</strong></p></td><td><p><strong>Percentage
of overall complaints</strong></p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Delays</p></td><td><p>68.95%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Lack
of updates on case progression</p></td><td><p>11.33%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Claim
handling</p></td><td><p>9.77%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Failure to respond to letters</p></td><td><p>4.10%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Applicant
provided with conflicting information</p></td><td><p>2.93%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Failure
to provide timescales</p></td><td><p>1.76%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Failure to return
phone calls</p></td><td><p>0.59%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Errors when recording telephone
application information</p></td><td><p>0.20%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Impolite staff
member</p></td><td><p>0.20%</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Poor customer service</p></td><td><p>0.20%</p></td></tr></tbody></table><p>
</p><p>The total number of complaints the CICA received in each of the last five years,
including those cases (a) escalated to stage 2 and (b) progressed to stage 3, are
as follows:</p><table><tbody><tr><td><p><strong>Year</strong></p></td><td><p><strong>Complaints
received</strong></p></td><td><p><strong>Escalated to Stage 2</strong></p></td><td><p><strong>Escalated
to Stage 3</strong></p></td></tr><tr><td><p>2016-17</p></td><td><p>1122</p></td><td><p>120</p></td><td><p>7</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>2015-16</p></td><td><p>533</p></td><td><p>39</p></td><td><p>6</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>2014-15</p></td><td><p>491</p></td><td><p>26</p></td><td><p>9</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>2013-14</p></td><td><p>204</p></td><td><p>8</p></td><td><p>1</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>2012-13</p></td><td><p>284</p></td><td><p>10</p></td><td><p>5</p></td></tr></tbody></table><p>
</p><p>Over half of complaints received in 2016/17 were from paid representatives.
A significant portion of these were from firms of solicitors who lodged block complaints
for their CICA caseload with a view to influencing the speed of the decision making
process.</p><p> </p><p>During the course of 2016/17 the CICA revised their operating
model and increased staff numbers following an extensive recruitment exercise. They
have also recently introduced measures that develop and streamline digital processes,
which have reduced the claim processing time by 30 days. The new online service, which
will be introduced later this financial year, will allow applicants and their representatives
to view the progress of their case online. It is expected that these measures will
reduce the time taken to finalise claims and lead to a reduction in complaints.</p>
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