► Students Complaints Procedure

Student Complaints Procedure

University of Ulster is committed to providing all our students with a high quality educational experience. Securing feedback from students on their experience of University life either negative or positive is an integral part of the University’s approach to the development and enhancement of the quality of all aspects of our services.

University of Ulster believes that students should feel able to express dissatisfaction about any aspect of the services they provide or about the actions or lack of actions by their staff.

The Student Complaints Procedure is a procedure which seeks to provide an accessible, fair and straightforward system which enables students to raise concerns and which causes an effective, timely and appropriate response.
*No student will be disadvantaged because he or she has made a complaint in good faith.
How  do I make a complaint?

To make a complaint you will need to fill in a CS1 Form. Please see below for this link.

What happens if I don’t understand all of the form?
Feel free to contact your Students’ Union for advice and support on this matter. Your campus officer, Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs can assist you with completion of this form.

Nature of the complaint

Depending on the nature of the student’s complaint, they should refer to and read the University of Ulster ‘Student Complaints Procedure’ handbook. This can be found on the University of Ulster website link below.
If the complaint  cannot be resolved at an informal level (stage 1 of the Student Complaints Procedure leaflet) then a student is entitled to progress to stage 2 of the complaints procedure  making it a formal complaint.

Student Complaints Procedure Leaflet and Information

http://www.ulster.ac.uk/quality/qmau/complaints.html  - follow this link for copies of the Student Complaints leaflet and the CS1 and CS2 forms.
A list of senior staff to which formal complaints on form CS1 should be made is provided within the above link. Further copies are available from any of the University Libraries, Academic Registry, Student Support or Students' Union offices or from this webpage.

If you are unsure if your complaint falls within the scope of this procedure or if you require general advice on the most appropriate way to pursue your complaint, the Student Complaints Liaison Officer will be pleased to assist. You can contact the Student Complaints Liaison Officer by writing to:

The Student Complaints Liaison Officer
Room J503
University of Ulster
Cromore Road
Coleraine
BT52 1SA

or by e-mail at studentcomplaints@ulster.ac.uk

*You should note that the Student Complaints Liaison Officer can act in an advisory capacity only and will not comment on the validity or likely outcome of your complaint.

About the form

Student Complaint Form

http://www.ulster.ac.uk/quality/qmau/cs1form.pdf

The student is expected to have read the Student Complaints Leaflet before completion of this form. Once they have done so, Parts 1&2 are basic to complete. Parts 3&4 of the form asks for the details of the complaint being made and requests any information about informal approaches made to resolve the situation.
If a student feels that they are having difficulty with this form then they are entitled to contact their Student Union campus officer for assistance. The officer will be able to take you through the form and assist with  it’s completion.
*It is important to note that the CS1 Form needs to be submitted no later than 10 working days after the unsatisfactory outcome of stage 1 and normally not later than 25 working days after the incident giving rise to the complaint.
What should I expect to happen next?
Once the form has been completed, this should then be submitted to relevant Dean or Head of Department. If the student has any queries about who these individuals are then their Student Officer can point them in the right direction or advise them to contact their Course Director for this information.
Once your CS1 form has been submitted, the student should expect to receive a written response within 15 working days and this should indicate what action had been taken or is being proposed to resolve said complaint.

Lastly…

If on receipt of the written response given from Dean/Head of School concerned, the student is still not satisfied, the student can then write to the Student Complaints Liaison Officer using a form known as CS2. (See link below).

http://www.ulster.ac.uk/quality/qmau/complaints.html#stage3

This CS2 forms asks the student to provide details of the complaint and of the informal and formal methods that were made to resolve it. Form CS2 must normally be completed within 10 working days of receipt of response from the Dean/Head of School