General Optical Council

The General Optical Council (GOC) has today published its new fitness to practise Acceptance Criteria.

The Acceptance Criteria are a case management tool for the GOC Fitness to Practise (FTP) team to help decide whether or not to accept a complaint as an allegation of impaired fitness to practise.

If a complaint does not meet the Acceptance Criteria, the GOC will not open an investigation into whether the registrant’s fitness to practise is impaired. The criteria apply to all complaints relating to individual registrants.

The GOC will regularly review the criteria to ensure it is up to date in reflecting changes to legislation and case law and remains consistent with other associated guidance documents.

Keith Watts, GOC FTP Head of Case Progression, said “Fitness to practise is about dealing with serious misconduct, not minor clinical or consumer concerns which could not call into question a practitioner’s fitness to practise. The Criteria will make it easier for us to filter out complaints that could not lead to a finding of impairment, and will allow us to focus our resources where they are most needed. The Criteria will also have a secondary benefit in helping us to speed up our FTP process.”

Further information about the policy can be found here.

 

ENDS

 

For media enquiries please contact:

GOC Communications Team

General Optical Council
t: 020 7580 3898 (option 3)
e: communications@optical.org

 

Notes to editors
1. A detailed explanation of our FTP procedures, including decision-making at the end of an investigation can be found on our website: https://www.optical.org/en/Investigating_complaints/index.cfm

 

About the General Optical Council:

The GOC is the regulator for the optical professions in the UK. Its purpose is to protect the public by promoting high standards of education, performance and conduct amongst opticians. The Council currently registers around 29,000 optometrists, dispensing opticians, student opticians and optical businesses.