Social workers get names wrong

A bulletin from the Children and Young People’s Services Complaints Department said: “It is highlighted on a regular basis the issue of spelling and grammatical errors, incorrect names and dates of birth of the family involved in the assessment.

“Yes, we are all busy people, and yes, we make typos but families have told us that it makes them feel we are not focussed or paying attention to detail when we make these kinds of mistakes.

“If families are telling us this, how do other agencies and professionals who view the same documents interpret these inaccuracies?”

The memo adds: “In this age of mass and instant communication and subject access requests you never know where your written work will end up!”

A total of 238 complaints were made to the department last year, up from 212 from the previous year and the fifth annual rise.

One of the most complex cases took 171 hours to investigate, and one resulted in a “good will” payment of £5,000.