• Join Us

    • ANA Complaints Policy

    The Applied Neuroscience Association seeks feedback to achieve continuous improvement, assuring transparency and accountability. Where expectations of Service, Content, Systems or ANA Members appear not to be met, we would like the opportunity to respond.

    This notice sets out the Applied Neuroscience Association (or ‘ANA’, ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’) deals with complaints from a “User(s)” (“you” / “they”) explaining what we consider to be a complaint, how the process works if a complaint is made, and how to make a complaint.

    As a non-profit, we take any complaints seriously in relation to the conduct of those that volunteer for or partner with ANA and/or regarding the use of ANA services (see ANA Terms of Use for Definitions and Interpretation). 

    We are committed to listening to, learning from, and responding to our members and network users striving for continual process and service improvements and measuring user satisfaction through regular surveys. This will help ANA to improve our standards.

    Users can expect to be treated with care. We hope Users will also treat us in the same way. ANA cannot tolerate unacceptable behaviour, such as harassment, threats or abuse. 

    For an investigation to be fair, we need to allow sufficient time to investigate the complaint and to consider all the facts. Users must provide all relevant material and be prepared to share the material with the individual affected should the complaint be about an ANA Member; ANA will be unable to pursue a complaint otherwise.

    Complaint Procedure 

    What is a complaint?

    A complaint entails any expression of dissatisfaction with the standard of the ANA services, and/or the conduct of ANA members or volunteers that calls for a response. 

    How to make a complaint?

    If you have a complaint, please contact info@appliedneuroscienceassociation.com in the first instance, using the SUBJECT: ‘Complaint’.

    ANA will apply best endeavours to resolve the complaint informally. If the User is not satisfied, their complaint would move to follow statutory procedures, and the process formalised accordingly.  

    Complaints where ANA is unable to investigate and respond:

    Relating to criminal matters whereby your first point of contact should be the police (or other relevant authorities) first;

    Regarding the scientific competence or practice of individuals or organisations acting beyond the qualifications that ANA has recognised on member registration; Users must deal with the individual direct;

    Regarding ANA policy decisions

    Regarding ANA members and volunteers operating outside of ANA and delivery of ANA Services;

    Regarding ANA registrants that have not been approved beyond registration or who have been suspended or removed from the ANA register;

    Matters that have already been fully investigated through this complaint’s procedure;

    Repetitive and unacceptable complaints as defined in this Notice;

    How ANA responds to a complaint

    Any action we take to put matters right in response to a complaint can include any combination of remedies. Any remedy applied needs to be proportionate and appropriate.  

    1. ANA will send an email acknowledging the complaint and ask the User to confirm or explain the details of their dissatisfaction if not already done so. We will also let the User know the name of the person who will be dealing with their complaint. The User can expect to receive this email acknowledgement within 10-15 days of ANA receiving the initial complaint. 

    2. We will record the initial complaint in the ANA Feedback Register on the day of receipt. 

    3. We will then start the initial investigation by reviewing any evidence and getting an understanding of the circumstances that are the subject of the initial complaint. This process will be transparent and where matters can be dealt with properly under this procedure, we will try to resolve it informally.

    4. Where required, ANA will invite the User within 10 days of the end of the initial investigation to a digital meeting to discuss and hopefully resolve the complaint; where the User says they are happy with the investigation response and all correspondence ends. 

    5. If the User does not want a meeting or it is not possible to attend, we will send the User a reply regarding the initial complaint. This will include suggestions for resolving the matter. We will do this within 10 days of completing the initial investigation. 

    6. In any event, ANA will comply with any statutory procedures that may relate to the User complaint should the User wish to take the matter further by writing to info@appliedneuroscienceassociation.com within 10 days of the initial investigation result being received.

    7. For the secondary investigation, you should explain why you continue to be dissatisfied and how you would like to see the matter resolved. At this stage we would need to begin a second investigation and aim to complete this part of the process within 10 working days.

    Confidentiality 

    All complaints received will be dealt with confidentially and in accordance with the requirements of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Subject to the need to disclose information as required by statutory authorities, and/or as a result of legal obligations. 

    Complaint details, outcomes and any actions taken are recorded in the ANA Feedback Register and used for ANA service improvement in the future, including understanding better what types of problems are most prevalent, and how well we are doing to resolve them. 

    Remedies 

    Depending on the nature and seriousness of the complaint, ANA will act transparently to:

     

      • accept responsibility where it’s due (in some cases ANA may not be able to progress the complaint further, explaining why); 

      • understand the full circumstances of the complaint; 

     

      • put things right as is appropriate and reasonable;

      • offer conciliation if we think it could help resolve the complaint

      • learn lessons and change policy and practice where proportionate and sensible to do so. 

    Repetitive and Unacceptable Complaints 

    Repetitive complaint behaviour may occur where difficulties in handling such complex and challenging situations can place undue stress and strain on the complainant and/or ANA dealings with the complainant.

    Some of these complaints if repetitive can, for example, become costly to handle where responding to them may be a disproportionate use of time or turn vexatious.

    A repetitious request is defined as:

    Contains no fresh allegations or evidence

    Is substantially the same as a previous complaint

    No fresh evidence which was not reasonably available

    Unacceptable complaint behaviour may occur when the User may act out of character. We do not view behaviour as unacceptable just because a User is assertive. However, we acknowledge that situations between a User and ANA may escalate where the behaviour of the User turns to any form of harassment, or abuse including, aggression, threats, or intimidation. 

    ANA have the right to undertake our work free from repetitive and unacceptable complaint behaviour, harassment, abuse, aggression, threats or intimidation.

    ANA have the right to restrict or bring to an end communication with the User and where applicable, to relinquish any memberships, suspending or removing them from the ANA register.

     

    Applied Neuroscience Association 
    Last updated: 09/05/23