Complaints Manager

Experienced Complaints Manager Opportunity

We have a great opportunity for an experienced Complaints Manager to join Freebridge as our senior operational lead for complaint handling! You'll have the authority to resolve disputes fairly and promptly, and the influence to turn complaints into real improvements across the organisation. If you're passionate about customer experience, service improvement, and ensuring customers' voices drive positive change, we'd love to hear from you!

Our Mission

Our Freebridge Community Housing goal is to provide affordable, safe, and quality homes for current and future generations, for those who need a place to call home. Freebridge was set up in 2006, to receive the transfer of the Borough Council of King's Lynn and West Norfolk's housing stock. We now have over 7500 properties across West and North Norfolk, in addition to building new homes for social and affordable rent, and to support those who want to move into shared home ownership. We've had numerous achievements, including delivering our customers' promises and bringing homes to the Decent Homes Standard, affording our customers a much better quality of living.

At Freebridge, we live by our values: Belong, Own It, Think Customer, One Team One Purpose, and Be the Change.

Requirements

Outline of key responsibilities:

• Owning end-to-end delivery of our two-stage complaints process, ensuring all complaints are investigated and resolved to the customer's satisfaction within Code timescales, and that customers receive a consistently professional service
• Personally leading the most complex, high-profile or high-risk complaints, including Stage 2 escalations, MP and Councillor correspondence, and cases with serious reputational or financial exposure
• Identifying and implementing best practice in complaints and correspondence handling, supported by processes that help the team work effectively and efficiently
• Leading and developing a team of three Complaint Handlers and a Senior Complaint Handler, who takes responsibility for Stage 2 complaints and provides quality assurance on the team's Stage 1 work
• Coaching front-line teams on first-time resolution, and identifying and supporting their training and development needs in complaint handling
• Acting as our key operational contact for the Housing Ombudsman, responding to information requests and managing the relationship on day-to-day casework
• Ensuring complaint handling and redress orders, including all Housing Ombudsman determinations, are fully actioned, complied with and evidenced
• Chairing our Lessons Learned Group, undertaking deep-dive root cause analysis on complaints within scope of the Lessons Learned Framework, including all Housing Ombudsman maladministration determinations
• Owning the quality, accuracy, and consistency of complaints recording, ensuring data and management information are fit for purpose to support performance reporting, trend analysis, and regulatory returns
• Undertaking root cause analysis on complaints more broadly, to identify development areas and drive the improvements needed
• Support the production of annual complaints performance and service improvement reporting for senior leaders and the Board
• Monitor complaint trends, systemic issues, and organisational risk, driving improvements across services
• Manage complaint-related compensation and redress in line with delegated authority arrangements
• Act as a source of advice and expertise on complaint handling best practice across the organisation