Summary
- Section 52 of the Communications Act 2003 places a duty on Ofcom to set general conditions to ensure that communications providers establish and maintain procedures to, amongst other things, handle complaints and resolve disputes between them and their domestic and small business customers.
- General Condition C4 (GC C4) is the relevant condition for complaints handling and dispute resolution.
- Under GC C4.2 communications providers must have and comply with procedures that conform to the Ofcom Approved Complaints Code when handling complaints made by domestic and small business customers. A copy of the Ofcom Approved Complaints Code is set out in the annex to GC C4.
- Under General Condition C4.3, providers are obliged to be a member of, and comply with, an approved alternative dispute resolution (‘ADR’) scheme.
- There are penalties for non-compliance with General Condition C4. Under Section 96 of the Communications Act 2003, Ofcom may impose a penalty of up to ten per cent of turnover for failure to comply with a formal notification within the time period specified.
GC C4, and the Ofcom Approved Complaints Code, can be found in the unofficial consolidated version of the General Conditions (PDF, 1.3 MB).