Decision report 201004921

Summary
Mr C and his family had been registered with a medical practice for several years. However, when he called for an appointment he was told that he had been removed from the list and would have to re-register. He complained to the practice about this and was told that he had been removed because correspondence sent to him had been returned unopened. We found that the practice should have checked to see if he was still at the address, but that a clerical error meant that he had instead been wrongly noted as 'no trace' on their list. We also found that they did not properly explore the reasons for this when Mr C complained and that these only became known after we investigated his concerns. Finally, following discussions with the NHS, we were able to tell Mr C that although he would have to re-register, he would be able to have a medical appointment in advance of that process. We did not uphold a complaint that the practice failed to warn him that he would be removed.

Recommendation
We recommend that the medical practice apologise to Mr C for their error.