Representing a student
A student can ask someone else to represent them in their complaint to us, for example a students’ union representative, a friend or relative. We will need the student’s permission to communicate with that person, which they can give by completing section two of our Complaint Form.
If you are representing a student through our process you will need to make sure that you:
- understand their complaint;
- know what outcome the student wants;
- can and will act in the student’s best interests and keep them fully informed throughout the process.
Once you have been appointed as a student’s representative, we will normally only correspond with you.
If a group of students has a complaint about the same issue(s), they may appoint one of their group to represent the whole group.
Our procedures are informal, so it is not usually necessary to use a lawyer. For this reason, we will not normally recommend that a provider should contribute towards a student’s legal costs, even if we decide the complaint is Justified.
Making a complaint to us does not prevent a student from bringing legal proceedings against the provider if they are unhappy with our final decision.
For more information on how to make a complaint on behalf of the student, please see our student hub.
Students
More information
Who can complain to us?
Learn more about who can complain to us and what they can complain about
Student representative bodies
How student representative bodies can help students with their complaint
Completion of Procedures Letters
Our guidance for Completion of Procedures (COP) Letters
What happens when a student complains to us?
Learn more about how we handle complaints, and what happens once we receive a complaint
Our Rules
Our Rules set out how our Scheme works, who can complain, what we can and can’t look at, how we review complaints, and what higher education providers should do
Case summaries
View examples of cases we receive and our approach to handling them, including our public interest cases and case summaries