• Read more about Introduction and Background

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (referred to as IOPC, or Organisation throughout the report)oversees the police complaints system in England and Wales. It makes decisions entirely independently of the police and government. IOPC investigates the most serious matters, including deaths following police contact and sets the standards by which the police should handle complaints.

IOPC has embarked on an extensive ‘Transformation’ programme. Its vision is to become a high performing organisation that delivers a brilliant service to users, partners, stakeholders and communities, putting the service user at the heart of the way the Organisation operates.

IOPC continue to use the Customer Service Excellence (CSE) Standard as a framework to contribute to achieving its priorities. The three-year recertification assessment against the CSE Standard took place in 2023.Due to limited resources in 2024, the format of an annual review, year one (AR1), was not completed, the annual review year two approach was used. As a result, the format of an annual review, year one, was used this year, 2025.

• Read more about Methodology

The annual review commenced with the Organisation uploading over 70 pieces of evidence to the Assessment Services Self-Assessment Tool, demonstrating how it continues to meet the CSE Standard. In addition, access was provided to a range of documentary evidence, including the Annual Report 2023/2024, Impact Report 2023/2024, Strategic Plan 2022/2027, Business Plan, Service Standards, Performance Framework and Governance Policies.

The Assessor conducted a desktop review of the presented evidence, focusing on areas of strength(Compliance Plus) and those identified for further improvement in 2023 and 2024.

The Assessor met with 15 staff members via Microsoft Teams to gain an understanding of the work undertaken by IOPC to improve the experience for service users. This put the evidence presented in the Self-Assessment Tool into context.

Following the meetings, feedback was provided on the outcome of the annual review, highlighting areas of strength that were awarded Compliance Plus and topics that will be of interest throughout the three-year recertification assessment in 2026.

The following report summarises the areas of strength and the topics the Assessor will be interested in throughout the assessment in 2026.

• Read more about Customer Service Excellence report 2025

Read this report to learn about our use of the Customer Service Excellence (CSE) Standard as a framework to contribute to achieving our organisational priorities.