Workloads are making it harder for a council to respond to complaints in a timely manner, a senior manager has warned. 

The percentage of the most serious stage two complaints Monmouthshire County Council responded to within its target of 20 working days – with a further 10 days for the heads of service to respond to findings – was just 42 per cent, a marginal one per cent improvement on the previous year.

For the lower level, stage one complaints, just 62 per cent were responded to within the 10 working days target, a drop from 72 per cent in the previous year.

The council recorded 162 “whole authority” complaints, which relate to all service areas other than social services, in the 2021/22 financial year with a further 17 complaints made about adult services and 23 about children’s services. 

The council’s customer relations manager Annette Evans told its governance and audit committee a council manager is required to investigate stage two complaints, other than those about social services which are subject to an external probe. 

She said: “With officers’ workload expanding it is difficult to get officers to investigate whole authority complaints as it is extra on top of their workload and it can impact on timescales, when (investigations) are started and completed.” 

Ms Evans said response times can also be impacted by factors such as staff being on leave, sickness and complainants not responding. 

For social services complaints Ms Evans said case are often “very complex and not straightforward” and said: “more often than not do go over the timescale.” 

Green Party councillor Ian Chandler said he was concerned at the slow response times and said targets had been set with the knowledge that social services complaints can be complex but Ms Evans said there are only a limited number of suitable investigators working for councils across Wales. 

Figures show that 48 stage one complaints and three stage two “whole authority” complaints were responded to within 11 to 30 days while 12 stage one and seven stage two complaints weren’t dealt with for more than 30 days. 

Cllr Chandler said: “The number of complaints exceeding 25 working days, that’s six to seven weeks, is extremely concerning to me.” 

Of the informal stage one complaints, two people had contacted the official watchdog, the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales, but it decided against launching investigations and another complainant, who had contacted the body, was referred to the council with their concerns investigated at stage one. 

Monmouthshire has one of the lowest levels of complaints reported to the ombudsman at 0.21 per 1,000 residents. 

As well as recording complaints the council said it received 455 comments, which didn’t require formal resolution so didn’t register as a complaint, in 2021/22 which was 20 per cent up from the 379 in the previous year. 

Compliments about council services were also up, from 204, to 246 in 2021/22.

Cllr Chandler said he was also concerned who decided whether a comment should be registered simply as feedback or a complaint. 

The Llantilio Crossenny councillor asked: “Whose responsibility is it to cross that threshold? Do the public have to respond to say ‘actually this is a complaint’ or is it for us to read it and say ‘this is a complaint’?” 

The committee was told the figures, which relate to the year ending March 2022, were late being reported to it due to discussions after they were presented to the council’s senior leadership team but the 2022/23 figures will be presented to the committee earlier in the year.