The authority has had as many complaints in the last five months as in the entire year prior to that
Joseph Connolly Local Democracy Reporter
17:58, 21 Nov 2025
One councillor agreed that it was a good thing that the council was getting lots of complaints(Image: Joseph Raynor/ Nottingham Post)
Rushcliffe Borough Council has had more complaints in the past five months through its complaints system than in the entire previous year.
The figures were reported at a Rushcliffe Borough Council meeting on Tuesday, November 18.
The council’s head of corporate services, Charlotte Caven-Atack, was presenting an annual report for 2024/2025 on customer feedback, stating that, as in previous years, the report was “positive” in her opinion.
But at the end of her report, she added that she wanted to “take the opportunity to manage expectations for when I sit here in 12 months time”.
“Unfortunately I don’t think I will be sitting here saying everything is the same as previous years,” said Ms Caven-Atack.
“I’m happy where we are for this year. Things are not looking as good in terms of the numbers for next year.”
The exact numbers of complaints recorded in the past five months were not disclosed, but in 2024/2025 there were 64 complaints, which, while Ms Caven-Atack described it as “positive”, was the highest for five years
When questioned by Councillor Hetvi Parekh (Con) about what this year’s complaints were about, Ms Caven-Atack explained that most were about one facet of council services.
“The increase that we’ve seen this year is not in what we call neighbourhood services – that’s pretty steady,” she said. “The increase we’ve seen this year is almost all in our council tax department.
“There have been some changes in legislation and prominent media figures who, not happy with the way enforcement is done, are encouraging people to question what they’re doing, which is fine, but it’s opening up avenues and making it easier for people to complain about where they stand in regard to their council tax.”
Ms Caven-Atack also highlighted that the rise in popularity of AI has made it easier for people to generate complaint letters at speed, which could have contributed to the increase.
But she said: “We don’t think there’s a big problem in the way we’re applying our policy. I’m actually quite pleased that residents are finding our complaints process easy to use and they feel that it’s worth them investing their time in complaining to us because it gives us the opportunity to put things right that have gone wrong.
“I don’t necessarily see it as anything other than a healthy sign of engagement, but perhaps I won’t be saying that this time next year – we’ll wait and see.”
In June, the Government announced a shake-up of council tax to “make life easier for local people”, including reforms to make yearly bills payable over 12 months rather than the current 10.
A public consultation was launched, which was highly publicised by the financial journalist Martin Lewis.
Labour councillor Mike Gaunt (Lab), a member of the Corporate Overview group, said he agreed that it was a good thing that the council was receiving a high level of complaints.
He said: “It is a good thing I suppose that we are receiving high levels of complaints because that is a sign that people are finding ways to be able to complain.
“As long as we’re aware of the fact that most of the complaints are resolved quickly, which they seem to be, it’s a good thing people are able to use the tech to be able to reach forward and do that.”
Councillor Gareth Williams (Con) added that numbers of complaints had started increasing when the council’s website was upgraded, making it easier for people to find where to complain.
Despite the numbers of complaints, Ms Caven-Atack highlighted the 196 compliments the council had received in 2024/2025, saying that the authority “tends to always get more compliments and complaints, which is nice.”
In a statement to Nottinghamshire Live, Ms Caven-Atack said: “Councils nationally have seen an increase in complaints in recent times.
“To some degree this is in line with increases in challenges of council tax levels prompted by national media interest, misinformation on social media and second home premiums, legislation issued by central government.
“Comparatively there was a low level of complaints in 2024/25 for RBC. There were 64 recorded in contrast to the many services we deliver all year round and annually the hundreds of thousands of pieces of correspondence we have with residents. This low number we feel highlights the great services, place, lifestyle and sport we pride ourselves on.
“In that time there was also only a marginal increase in those escalated to a second stage and none were investigated or upheld by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.”