Case Summaries

They had expected 10% of the course to include practical dissection. This part of the course was suspended because potentially dangerous levels of a chemical had been detected in the laboratory, above the safe workplace limit. The group was also concerned that they may have been exposed to potentially harmful levels of the chemical prior to the laboratory being closed. They said there had been inadequate health and safety management. The provider initially upheld the complaint in part and offered £1,000 for distress and inconvenience and £150 for the delay in resolving the matter.

The students brought the complaint to us, as a group. It became clear in the early stages of our process that some relevant evidence had not been considered as part of the complaint. The provider re-ran its review of the complaint and upheld it. It accepted that there had been a procedural irregularity, that there was new evidence which cast doubt on the original decision, and that its previous decision had been unreasonable. The provider apologised and offered £5,000 in compensation for distress and inconvenience, later increased to £6,000. It also outlined a number of opportunities for improvements it had identified as a result of the complaint.

18 of the students remained dissatisfied and returned to complain to us. We reviewed the complaint and partly upheld it (we decided it was Partly Justified). We were satisfied that the offer provided an adequate remedy for the parts of the complaint that the provider had upheld. But the provider did not have sufficient risk monitoring and mitigation in place. Although there was no evidence to prove that the group had been exposed to unsafe levels of the chemical, we accepted that the students were very concerned about this. We recommended that the provider increase its offer to £8,000 to recognise the distress and inconvenience caused by the uncertainty regarding the level of risk exposure experienced by the group members.