The Optical Consumer Complaints Service (OCCS) has issued its annual report for the year 2017/18. Some trends from the report include: a decrease in customer service complaints from thirty-three per cent to twenty-six per cent and increase in the complexity of their caseload. The top complaint issues referred to OCCS were perceived errors with prescriptions, outcomes of laser eye surgery and dispensing.
97 per cent of enquiries were concluded with a resolution and 76 per cent of service users would use the OCCS service again.
During the 2017/18 year, OCCS achieved several of its objectives, including the implementation of a plan for improved accessibility for consumers with disabilities, sharing the insight of consumer complaints gained by OCCS with the public and optical professions, and improving consumer contact pathways to increase direct enquiries with OCCS rather than the GOC Fitness to Practice (FTP) team.
OCCS will continue to support the GOC during 2018/19 by continuing to improve upon their 2017/18 objectives, assisting the GOC FTP team to conclude FTP complaints quickly and efficiently, and preparing its services for the introduction of the FTP acceptance criteria.