Refusal of Treatment
We reserve the right to refuse treatment where our clinicians deem it inappropriate for any reason and the clinicians decision is final.
Terms of Business
- General
Treatment plans are the estimated costs of treatment and we will endeavour to inform you should the costs change once the treatment plan has begun. We respectfully request that fees are payable before or on the day of treatment.
We understand that from time to time it is necessary to cancel and rearrange an appointment. If you are able to give us 24hours’ notice we will be able to re-book your appointment and offer the appointment to someone else that needs to be seen.
If appointments are repeatedly cancelled or not attended the dentist reserves the right to refuse further appointments, especially if at peak times.
Payment Terms
We may charge a deposit for some courses of treatment.
For routine consultations and courses of treatment that can be completed in a single appointment, we will normally ask for payment at the completion of treatment.
If your treatment will require multiple appointments we will ask you to pay for each stage of treatment as it is completed.
We accept the following methods of payment:
· MasterCard, Visa, and Visa Debit
· Cash payments-correct amount as we do not keep cash in reception.
Zero Tolerance
Our staff come to work to care for others, and it is important for all members of the public and our staff to be treated with courtesy and respect.
To ensure this is fully observed, we have a zero tolerance policy. This means that aggressive or violent behaviour towards our staff or any member of the public within our surgery premises will not be tolerated under any circumstances.
Anyone giving verbal abuse to members of staff, either in person or over the telephone, will be sent a letter advising that this behaviour will not be tolerated. Any future violation of this will result in removal from the surgeries patient list; there will be no appeal process.We feel sure that you will understand that proper behaviour is absolutely necessary for our staff and patients, and that non-observance will not be accepted.
Your Medical History
We will ask you to record your medical history at various occasions. This information is vital to ensure that any treatment provided to you is delivered safely, and that we can care for you properly in an emergency. It is a legal requirement that we have an up-to-date medical history on record.
Patient Complaints
Code of practice for handling patient complaints
We want our service to meet your expectations. If you have a concern or complaint about any aspect of our service, we want to know what mistakes we made and identify how we can improve to ensure that we meet your expectations in future. Our aim is to learn from any feedback we receive and improve the service we provide to our patients.
We will deal with complaints courteously and promptly and aim to resolve the matter as quickly as possible.
Making a complaint
If you wish to make a complaint or simply let us know how we could have done better, please contact Dr A Dulku our Complaints’ Manager:
• By telephone on 02476344222
• By email at [email protected]
• By letter to Dr A Dulku, 25 Hinckley rd, Nuneaton, CV11 6LG
• In person.
The Complaints’ Manager usually works at the practice every day, and will endeavour to be available during these times. You may find it more convenient to make an appointment with Complaints’ Manager to ensure that he can dedicate sufficient time to meet with you.
If you contact the practice to make a complaint and the Complaints’ Manager is not available, we will arrange a convenient time for them to contact you. We will ask you for brief details of your complaint so that the Complaints’ Manager can gather any useful information before contacting you. You will be given a copy of the notes made for the Complaints’ Manager.
If the matter requires a more immediate response, we will arrange for a senior member of the dental team to deal with it.
If your complaint is about your dental treatment or the fee charged, we will usually ask the dentist concerned to contact you, unless you do not want this.We acknowledge all complaints in writing and enclose a copy of this code of practice as soon as possible, normally within 3 working days.
Investigating a complaint
We will offer to discuss the complaint with you and will ask how you would like to be kept informed of developments – by telephone, letters or e-mail or by face-to-face meetings. We will let you know how we will deal with your complaint and the likely time that the investigation will take to complete. If you do not wish to discuss the complaint further, we will still let you know the expected timescale for completing the investigation.
We will investigate your complaint within 10 working days unless a complex issue then that may take up to six months but we will keep you up to date with how it is progressing.
When we have completed our investigation, we will provide you with a full written report, unless you have told us that you do not wish for further communication. The report will explain how we considered the complaint, the conclusions we reached for each part of your complaint, details of any remedial action we have taken and whether further action is needed.
Records
We keep proper and comprehensive records of any complaints that we receive and the action we have taken following investigation. We review these records regularly to ensure that we recognise our mistakes and take every opportunity to improve our service.
If you are not satisfied
If your complaint was about your dental treatment and you are not satisfied with the result of our investigation, you can take up the matter with a relevant external organisation.
For complaints about NHS treatment:
The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, Millbank Tower, Millbank London SW1P 4QP (0345 015 4033 or www.ombudsman.org.uk).
Or-
NHS EnglandPO Box 16738
Redditch
B97 9PT
By email to: [email protected]
If you are making a complaint please state: ‘For the attention of the complaints team’ in the subject line.
By telephone: 0300 311 22 33
Or-
Care Quality Commission
Report the problem to another regulatory body, such as the Care Quality Commission (CQC). CQC are not responsible for dealing with individual complaints, but if it raises concerns over the service, it may wish to investigate further.
Cancellation Policy
In the event you need to rearrange or cancel your appointment please give at least 24 hours’ notice. You can call us between 9am and 5:00pm, at 024 7634 4222. A charge may be applied to appointments cancelled with less than 24 hours’ notice.
