Senior Complaints Operations Leader in Leicester

Welcome to Hastings Direct. We're a digital insurance provider with ambitious plans to become The Best and Biggest in the UK market. We've made huge investments in our data and tech capabilities over the past few years, along with nurturing our 4Cs culture. We're proud of the journey we're on as a company and know that our continued success will rely on the contribution of our talented colleagues.

We provide insurance for over four million customers, but we know there's even bigger opportunity out there. The fact you're now reading this job advert means we've tempted you to find out more about #lifeatHD - we really hope you like what you see, and you'll join us to share in the success of the exciting chapter that lies ahead.

We understand some people may not apply for jobs unless they feel they tick every box. If you're excited about joining us and think you have some of what we're looking for, even if you're not 100% sure we would love to hear from you.

As Senior Complaints Operations Leader, you'll be responsible for leading a large-scale complaints operation across Retail Insurance and Claims, with accountability for delivering fair customer outcomes, meeting regulatory requirements, driving operational performance and creating a culture of continuous improvement.

As a key member within our Complaints Leadership Team, you'll shape complaint strategies, influence broader business improvements and work closely with Claims, Customer Operations, Risk, Compliance and Learning & Development to reduce complaint demand and improve customer experience.

Job details - you'll need to have demonstrable experience in:

• Operational Leadership - leading and developing a team of Operational Leaders responsible for complaint handling operations, creating a high-performing culture focused on accountability, customer outcomes and employee engagement, ensuring effective resource planning and operational capacity management and delivering against complaint volume, productivity, quality and customer outcome targets.
• Customer and Regulatory Outcomes - ensuring complaints are handled fairly, consistently and in line with FCA DISP requirements and Consumer Duty expectations, driving improvements in complaint resolution at the earliest possible stages, reducing complaint cycle times and increasing first touch resolution opportunities and maintaining robust governance and controls, acting as an escalation point for complex, high-risk and high-profile complaints.
• Insurance and Claims Expertise - providing senior operational leadership across both Retail Insurance and Claims complaints, using deep understanding of policy administration, underwriting, customer servicing and claims journeys to identify root causes, partnering with Claims and Operational teams to address recurring customer pain points and supporting business‑wide initiatives to improve claim and service experiences that generate complaint volumes.
• Performance Management - owning the delivery of operational KPI's including complaint volumes, resolution times, ombudsman overturn rates, customer outcomes, quality measures, employee engagement, cost efficiency and presenting business performance insights and recommendations to senior stakeholders and executive audiences.
• Continuous Improvement - challenging existing processes and identifying opportunities for automation, digitisation and simplification, leading transformation initiatives to increase efficiency while maintaining customer outcomes and supporting the implementation of new technologies/complaint handling capabilities.
• Stakeholder Management - building strong partnerships, representing complaints within governance forums and strategic business initiatives and supporting executive reporting and regulatory engagement where required.

Essential skills/experience:

• Significant operational leadership experience within complaints, customer operations, claims operations or conduct‑focused environments.
• Proven experience of managing senior operational leaders, with large spans of control and leading operational teams through multiple management layers - with exceptional coaching capability.
• Strong understanding of FCA complaint handling requirements and Consumer duty.
• Track record of leading change, transformation and continuous improvement programmes, with experience of using MI, data and insight to drive decision making.
• Strong understanding of Retail Insurance products and Claims knowledge across one or more insurance lines.

The interview process:

• Recruiter intro/screening call
• 1st stage interview with hiring leader
• 2nd interview with hiring leaders leader

As a Disability Confident employer, we're committed to ensuring our recruitment processes are fully inclusive.