Team Leader - Patient Access

Team Leader - Patient Access The closing date is 28 January 2026

The post holder will be required to manage a team and will be responsible for the coordination of duties across that team.

The post holder will be required to demonstrate excellent communication, organisational and supervisory skills, and be able to work as an effective member of a multidisciplinary team.

They will support the Patient Access management team to deliver our KPIs and provide a high quality administrative service to support our patient pathways.

They will be responsible for ensuring their team deliver an effective and efficient service to service users including clinicians, nurses and other key staff groups.

Please note: the closing date is a guide only. This role may close sooner due to a high volume of applications. Please submit your application as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.

Main duties of the job The post holder will manage the delivery of a high quality, safe and compassionate healthcare service to patients. They will have responsibility for ensuring that all administrative processes are efficient and effective and enable the team and the Trust to meet high standards of performance. The post holder will have specific responsibility for driving forward excellent standards of customer service taking action where levels of service delivery fall short of what is required or do not uphold Trust values. The post holder will line manage a team of administrators and will be responsible for organising workload and cover, recruiting and inducting new staff members, identifying training and support required by individuals and managing performance.

About us Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust is one of England's top-performing and safest trusts. We operate two main acute hospital sites-Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and West Middlesex University Hospital-along with award winning clinics across North West London.

Our nearly 7,500 staff care for a diverse population of 1.5 million, providing full clinical services, including maternity, A&E, and children's services, plus specialist HIV and sexual health clinics. The Care Quality Commission rates us "Good" in safety, effectiveness, care, and responsiveness, and "Outstanding" in leadership and resource use.

We continually invest in our facilities, including a £30m expansion of critical care at Chelsea and Westminster and an £80m Ambulatory Diagnostic Centre at West Middlesex.

We welcome applications for flexible working arrangements, accommodating requests where possible to support our staff and patient needs.

The Trust is committed to equality and welcomes applications from all, regardless of background. Adjustments can be made for disabled candidates. Early application is advised as vacancies may close once sufficient applications are received. If you haven't heard from us within three weeks of the closing date, your application was likely unsuccessful. Employment is subject to a six-month probationary period.

Some roles may require weekend shifts at multiple sites.

Job responsibilities Roles and responsibilities

• Take overall responsibility for efficient running of the administrative function, maintaining effective office/departmental systems and processes.
• Work with other members of the wider team to ensure quality standards are adhered to.
• Ensure that the team is aware of relevant Trust policies and procedures relating to service delivery.
• Develop new processes for the service with a view continuously improving the patient experience.
• Create and prepare reports relating to service delivery and performance and recommends actions where areas of improvement are identified.
• Take responsibility for the even distribution of workload within the department, initiating amendments or improvements where necessary
• Take responsibility for patient/client care in terms of dealing with complex patient queries, particularly where patients are distressed and emotional.
• Mange complex patient queries referred from other staff to an appropriate resolution
• Manages any complaints in accordance with the directorates clinical governance/complaints guidelines.
• ensure appropriate training and induction is in place for new members of the team, and refresher and mandatory training takes place for all members of staff
• Provide cross cover for Team Leader colleagues across the clinical administrative teams where necessary
• Organise and conduct annual appraisals with staff and develop PDPs, ensure training and development needs are met. To evaluate staff performance against PDPs taking appropriate action to ensure that staff abilities and aptitudes are developed and potential maximized in line with KSF
• Co ordinate regular team meetings and including other relevant key personnel
• Maintain personal files for individuals and maintain as confidential
• Effectively address issues of poor performance, conduct and attendance
• Complaints within specified timeframes, liaising with divisional managers and clinicians as necessary to obtain required information to formulate a response
• Collate staff attendance figures and manpower returns and send to the appropriate department
• Ensure that the team is aware of relevant Trust policy & procedure updates
• Oversee stationery supplies and other stock and non-stock items and authorise new orders in line with budgetary constraints.
• Ensure trust-wide standard operating procedures and policies developed for clinical administrative processes are adhered to; participate in the review of and development of new procedures
• Assist line Manager in maintaining a quality assurance process to ensure standard operating procedures, policies and procedures are being adhered to within the clinical administrative team
• Pro actively monitor all administrative processes and responsibilities highlighting any system, procedural or capacity issues in line with the needs of the service
• Attend on behalf of the service all relevant Trust wide user groups cascading relevant information to staff
• Ensure the office environment is maintained within Health and Safety standards and projects a professional image
• Comply with Trust procedures for tracking the whereabouts of patient records at all times
• Assist all members of staff and patients with the uptake of new technologies, and where required become a user champion to embed learning

Clinical Office

• Co ordinate the patient pathway ensuring that clinical priorities are actioned, elective access targets are met and all staff and patients informed as appropriate
• Ensure that all clinical administrative transcription including clinical correspondence are actioned in a timely fashion in accordance with Trust standards.
• Compose agendas, taking and typing minutes at specialty meetings
• Ensure that referrals are graded within Trust standards
• Monitor performance against specific targets such as referral to treatment time and letter turnaround time
• Ensure GP and patient enquiries and complaints are dealt with promptly and to Trust standards
• Receive patient enquiries by mail, telephone or email, actioning as appropriate and disseminating to relevant colleagues as necessary
• Direct patients to the most appropriate source of information for bookings for investigations, outpatient attendances, operations or admissions
• Ensure patients are seen in outpatients, have diagnostic tests and are admitted in accordance with national and local access targets for elective treatment, cancer etc
• Liaise with other health professionals relating to the patient care pathway and service delivery
• Create new clinics and amend existing clinics on PAS as appropriate.
• Keep comprehensive records of any cancelled and rescheduled clinics.
• Conduct regular reviews of clinic templates ensuring that they meet national outpatient targets, including E referral.
• Supply relevant data for Department of Health information returns, as required.
• Keep up to date with new IT initiatives and all PAS developments as they affect services.
• Collate clinic cancellations/reductions provided by the Outpatient teams and distribute information to management teams
• Ensure all patient records are returned to the medical records library for storage in line with the Trust policy for medical records
• Develop and maintain rotas so that the above areas are consistently staffed, and so that staff members are exposed to all areas so as to provide the skills for cross cover where needed
• Ensure cover is provided for all reception areas within the Trust if needed including booking of new, follow up and diagnostic appointments, and elective admissions, where required
• Ensure systems are in place and procedures are adhered to, so that patients may book appointments and theatre admissions at any reception desk when visiting the hospital
• Make sure clinic outcome forms are processed in a timely way, resolving any issues locally with clinical teams, escalating to the appropriate manager if needed
• Troubleshoot any administrative process issues with the reception teams as they arise
• Ensure the reception assists patients and staff with new technologies introduced to reception and clinic areas where needed. To nominate members of the team as user champions, ensuring expert members of staff are always on hand

Bookings

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