Complaints Procedure

Elephant and Castle Carpet Cleaning Complaints Procedure

This Complaints Procedure explains how Elephant and Castle Carpet Cleaning manages and resolves concerns about our carpet, upholstery and related cleaning services. Our aim is to provide a clear, fair and timely process so that any issue is addressed professionally and used to improve our services.

Our Commitment to Resolving Complaints

We want every customer to be satisfied with the standard of work, conduct of staff and overall service experience. If something has not met your expectations, we encourage you to tell us as soon as possible. We will treat all complaints seriously, investigate them carefully and respond in a respectful and constructive manner.

We are committed to:

Listening to your concerns without making assumptions, acknowledging your complaint promptly, investigating what happened and why, explaining our findings in clear language, putting things right where we are at fault, and learning from feedback to improve our carpet and upholstery cleaning services.

What This Procedure Covers

This procedure covers complaints about:

The quality of any cleaning services provided, including carpets, rugs, upholstery and hard floor areas, the behaviour, attitude or professionalism of our cleaning staff, damage or alleged damage to property during a visit, missed or late appointments, and communication or administrative errors connected to your booking.

This procedure does not deal with general enquiries, quotation requests or routine booking changes, which should be handled through our usual customer service channels.

How to Make a Complaint

We encourage you to raise the issue as soon as possible after the service so we can investigate while details are still clear.

You can make a complaint by providing the following information through your usual communication method with us:

Your full name, the service address, the date and approximate time of the cleaning visit, a clear description of what went wrong, and any supporting information you can provide, such as photos of the affected area.

Please state that you wish to make a formal complaint so that we can log it correctly and handle it under this procedure.

Stage One: Initial Review and Acknowledgement

Once we receive your complaint, we will log it in our internal system and assign it to a person responsible for handling it. We aim to acknowledge complaints within three working days. In this acknowledgement, we will confirm that we have received your complaint, outline the next steps in the process and provide an estimated timescale for a full response.

Stage Two: Investigation of Your Complaint

An appropriate member of our team, who was not directly involved in the delivery of the service where possible, will investigate the complaint. The investigation may include reviewing job notes and booking details, speaking with the cleaning operatives who attended, examining any photos or evidence you have supplied, and, where necessary and practical, arranging a visit to re-inspect the affected area.

We aim to complete our investigation and provide a written or clearly recorded response within ten working days of acknowledging your complaint. If, for any reason, we need additional time, we will let you know, explain why and give a revised timescale.

Our Response and Possible Outcomes

After we have completed our investigation, we will set out our findings and decision. Our response will explain whether we uphold your complaint in full, uphold part of your complaint, or do not uphold your complaint. Where we accept that we are at fault, we will also outline appropriate remedial steps.

Depending on the nature of the issue, possible outcomes may include:

A repeat or corrective clean for the affected area, where suitable, a partial or full refund, where appropriate, practical steps to repair or make good damage we have accepted responsibility for, and changes to our internal processes, staff training or supervision to prevent similar issues in future.

Stage Three: Escalation of Your Complaint

If you are dissatisfied with the outcome of Stage Two, you may ask for your complaint to be reviewed again. Please explain which aspects of the decision you disagree with and why, and provide any additional information you believe is relevant.

The escalated review will be carried out by a more senior member of our team, who will reconsider the complaint, the evidence available and the Stage Two decision. We aim to provide a final written or clearly recorded response to escalated complaints within ten working days of your escalation request, or we will inform you if more time is needed.

The decision at this stage will normally be our final position on the matter.

Time Limits for Making a Complaint

In order to investigate effectively, we ask that complaints are raised within 30 days of the service date. Complaints made after this period may be more difficult to review in detail, although we will still consider them where possible and appropriate.

Fair Treatment and Confidentiality

All customers will be treated fairly and without discrimination when making a complaint. Your complaint will be handled in confidence, and information will only be shared within our business where it is necessary to investigate and resolve the matter. We expect our staff and customers to communicate respectfully throughout the process.

Using Complaints to Improve Our Service

Every complaint is an opportunity for us to review how we work and identify improvements. We regularly review complaint patterns and outcomes so that we can enhance our cleaning methods, equipment, staff training and overall service delivery in the local area. By following this Complaints Procedure, we aim to resolve individual issues and build long-term trust with our customers.