Role Purpose
To lead the day-to-day operational delivery of the complaints handling function, ensuring that complaints are resolved effectively, fairly, and in line with regulatory expectations (including FCA DISP and Consumer Duty). The Complaints Operations Manager is responsible for managing people, performance, processes, and workflow to achieve service level agreements (SLAs), maintain quality standards, and deliver excellent customer outcomes across investment and pension complaints.
Key Responsibilities
Operational Management
- Oversee the day-to-day complaints handling operation, including resourcing, case allocation, and queue management.
- Ensure timely resolution of complaints in line with FCA DISP timeframes and internal service standards.
- Monitor team performance against KPIs (e.g. case volumes, response times, redress accuracy, FOS outcomes).
- Act as the escalation point for complex or high-risk cases and support handlers in applying sound judgement.
People Leadership
- Line manage team leaders, complaints handlers, and support staff, providing coaching, development, and performance management.
- Foster a collaborative and customer-focused culture, promoting ownership and accountability.
- Lead training and onboarding plans for new staff and upskilling for existing team members (e.g., pensions, investment products, redress calculations).
Process Excellence
- Continuously assess and improve complaints handling processes to drive efficiency, quality, and consistency.
- Work with the Head of Complaints, QA, and Technical Leads to ensure procedures are clear, compliant, and reflect current best practice.
- Support the development and maintenance of knowledge libraries, process maps, and training materials.
Governance & Quality Assurance
- Ensure complaints are handled in line with regulatory expectations (e.g. FCA DISP, Consumer Duty, TCF) and internal risk frameworks.
- Work closely with QA, Risk, and Compliance teams to identify trends, control weaknesses, and remedial actions.
- Monitor vulnerability flags, high-risk complaints, and conduct-related issues, escalating appropriately.
MI & Reporting
- Contribute to complaint MI packs and operational dashboards, providing insight into volumes, themes, performance, and resourcing needs.
- Identify and highlight emerging issues or hotspots to the Head of Complaints and RCA teams.
Stakeholder Engagement
- Collaborate with departments such as Customer Services, Operations, Product, and Risk to resolve cross-functional complaints.
- Represent the complaints function in operational forums and contribute to wider initiatives (e.g. Consumer Duty readiness, service improvements).
Skills & Experience
Essential:
- Proven experience managing a complaints operation or customer resolution team in UK financial services, ideally with exposure to investments or pensions.
- Strong knowledge of FCA DISP, Consumer Duty, and regulatory complaint expectations.
- People management experience with a track record of developing high-performing teams.
- Ability to manage workflows, triage priorities, and balance quality with efficiency.
- Skilled at interpreting case detail, applying judgement, and guiding others on complex complaint resolution.
Desirable:
- Experience working with vulnerable customers or regulated advice complaints.
- Familiarity with FOS processes and redress calculation principles.
- Experience using complaints case management tools and reporting platforms (e.g. CRM systems, Power BI).
Key Competencies
- Operational Delivery
- People Leadership
- Complaint Resolution & Escalation Handling
- Regulatory Compliance & Risk Awareness
- Communication & Influence
- Coaching & Development
- Workflow Management
- Problem Solving & Decision Making
Qualifications
- Preferred:
- Leadership or management qualifications (e.g., ILM, CMI)
- Financial services or compliance-related certifications (e.g., CII, ICA)
- Redress and complaint handling training
A little about us
We’re the Nucleus Financial Platforms group and we help make retirement more rewarding.
People come first - whether it’s our colleagues, or the advisers and customers we support, we know that working in partnership and collaboration leads to the best outcomes. Together, we’ve shaped the platform to how it is today. We work hard, and we celebrate hard too.
Our ambition is to create a platform with a difference, putting the customer centre stage meant tearing up the rule book and starting from scratch. We’ve come a long way since then, but our mission remains just as focused. That’s why our culture, values, and social responsibility are things we keep at the top of our agenda – because we know they matter and have a big impact.
Our culture is one of the many things that sets us apart from the pack. We want to have an environment where our people feel that they can make a real difference, know they’ll be rewarded for their efforts and more importantly, enjoy themselves at work.
Inclusion and diversity at Nucleus
As with most things in life, who cares, wins. We really care about inclusion.
For us it’s not a tick box exercise; inclusion and diversity are embedded in our culture and everything we do. It’s a commercial imperative. It isn’t about being PC. It’s about being future-relevant and durable. We owe it to ourselves and the industry to ensure we are playing our part in creating a fair, balanced and transparent financial services sector.
More diversity means broader experience, a wider set of perspectives and a better collective ability to problem-solve. And it means being more representative of customer groups, which supports areas such as product development.
At Nucleus, we offer a generous blend of benefits for the things that really matter to our people, including a non-contributory pension, bonus, enhanced parental leave, paid time off for emergencies, health and wellbeing initiatives and flexible working options.
