GOC approves new FTP acceptance criteria

New fitness to practise acceptance criteria was approved by the General Optical Council during a quarterly meeting in London last week.

Criteria, set to be introduced in September, defined the circumstances where the GOC will accept a complaint – with those that do not meet the criteria instead closed.

‘The criteria will be beneficial to both the public and registrants, allowing for more efficiency and speed in handling cases that raise fitness to practise concerns, and allowing registrants to avoid the stress of being involved in an FTP case when it is not necessary,’ the regulator said.

During the same meeting, the Optical Consumer Complaints Service (OCCS) presented its annual report for 2017/18, when customer service issues comprised 26% of overall complaints – down 7%.