Can we handle your complaint?

Your complaint concerns:

• Québec’s public service.

  Before you do anything else, see the list of departments and agencies within the Québec Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. If you find the one that you want to file a complaint against, contact us.

• the health and social services network.

  Under the Public Protector Act, in most cases, you must first contact the local or regional service quality and complaints commissioner of the institution concerned.

  If you do not get an answer from the commissioner within 45 days, or if you are not satisfied with it, feel free to call us directly.

• You want to ask the Québec Ombudsman to intervene because you feel that the rights of a user or of a user group within the health and social services network are not being respected, or because a situation you’ve seen within the public service worries you.

  Make a report.

Your disclosure concerns:

• A wrongdoing committed within or concerning a public body.

  If you have witnessed such an act or have information suggesting that a wrongdoing has been or is about to be committed, make a disclosure to our branch on public integrity disclosure investigations (Direction des enquêtes sur les divulgations en matière d’intégrité publique).

Your complaint concerns:

• An educational institution (school, school board, cégep, university);

• Departments, organizations or agencies of the federal government;>

• Municipalities;

• Some public corporations (Loto-Québec, Hydro-Québec, Société des alcools du Québec), private companies, merchants and individuals;

• A physician, resident, dentist or pharmacist working in a hospital, CLSC or other health institution.

Other possible recourse

Other organizations can help you in other situations, for example, if you feel that:

• Your consumer rights have not been respected:
  Office de la protection du consommateur
• Your employer does not comply with the standards set in the Act respecting labour standards:
  Commission des normes, de l'équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail
• You have been discriminated against, bullied or exploited within the meaning of the Québec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms:
  Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse
• A government department or agency made the wrong decision concerning access to documents and the protection of your personal information:
  Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec
• You cannot exercise your right to vote:
  Directeur général des élections

For complaints concerning a physician, dentist or pharmacist, you have to submit the complaint to the local service quality and complaints commissioner of the institution where you were treated. The commissioner transfers your complaint to a medical examiner. If you disagree with the medical examiner’s conclusion, you can bring your complaint to the review committee of the institution concerned.

The private practices of doctors, dentists or other health professional are not covered by this complaint examination procedure unless there have a service agreement with a public institution within the health and social services network.