Summary: Miss B complained about the treatment of her housing application. We do not find fault causing Miss B injustice with the Council’s decision that Miss B refused two suitable housing offers so it should cancel her application. The Council was at fault later for expecting Miss B to get an occupational therapist’s assessment that the Council considered necessary. That fault caused Miss B avoidable uncertainty, time and trouble. The Council agreed our recommendations to apologise, pay Miss B £150 and change its procedures as necessary.
Summary: The Council failed to provide Mr X with accommodation when he asked for help when he became homeless. Mr X has a physical and mental health issues and had to sleep in a car for five months. The Council should pay Mr X £2500 to acknowledge the distress caused and risk to his health. The Council should also write to Mr X to apologise and take action to improve its services to ensure similar cases do not arise in future.
Summary: Ms X complains the Council has delayed in taking action following her complaint of damp and mould in her temporary accommodation. She says the problem is ongoing and is affecting her and her child’s health. The Council was at fault as it delayed in responding to her initial complaint, and delayed in completing the required work to solve the problem. Although it has paid her £120 compensation for part of the delay, this is not sufficient to remedy the delay and distress caused. The Council has agreed to complete the required work and pay Ms X a further £200.
Summary: The Council’s Housing Register and Nominations policy is not discriminatory. The Council acted in accordance with this policy. It sought medical information when required, and acted on the information it received.
Summary: Mr X complained about the Council serving an improvement notice on a property which he says was managed by another party. The Ombudsman should not investigate this complaint. This is because it was reasonable for Mr X to appeal the notice to the Residential Property Tribunal.
Summary: Mr D complains the Council gave him an incorrect email address and failed to reply to contact from him regarding his homeless application in 2018. The Ombudsman has not found any evidence of fault by the Council. He has completed the investigation and not upheld the complaint.
Summary: The complaint is about the way the Council has dealt with a disabled facilities grant application, housing disrepair and an application to its housing register. The Ombudsman’s view is there is no evidence of fault.
Summary: Miss X complained the Council failed to properly consider he application for housing. There was delay in the consideration of the application. However, there was no fault in the Council’s decision that Miss X was not eligible for medical priority for housing. The Council apologised and backdated Miss X’s award date to April 2017. This was a reasonable remedy to the complaint.
Summary: Mr X complains there were delays and errors made by the Council in its handling of his housing application. He says there has been poor communication throughout which has impacted negatively on his mental health. The Council was at fault when it delayed assessing his application. It also failed to take action after it received additional information, which delayed the award of a higher priority banding. The Council agrees to apologise to Mr X, pay him £150 for the time and trouble taken to bring his complaint, and provide evidence it has reminded officers to inform applicants of any change to their priority banding.
Summary: Mr B complains the Council wrongly removed his daughter from his housing application in 2016. The Ombudsman finds that acting in good faith on information provided to it, the Council ended Mr B’s transfer application without giving him appropriate opportunity to provide suitable evidence that his daughter remained in his household. Mr B was put to some considerable time and trouble seeking to resolve this matter.
Summary: The Ombudsman cannot investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision not to replace the water pipe to a property it owns and rents to Council tenants. This is because the Ombudsman has no power to investigate a council when it is acting as a landlord.
Summary: Mr B complains about the Council’s decision not to allocate to a different officer the inspection of his HMO properties when he feels he cannot work with the assigned officer. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint because there is no evidence of fault by the Council and an investigation is unlikely to lead to a different outcome.
Summary: Miss B complains about her priority on the housing register. She does not consider the Council has awarded sufficient priority to reflect her family’s medical and housing needs. As a result they have been living in unsatisfactory accommodation for many years. There was fault in how the Council handled Miss B’s application when her daughter made her own application. That has not made any difference to Miss B’s position. There has been no other fault but the Council should consider whether Miss B’s daughters can share a room.
Summary: Miss X complained about the Council’s failure to take action over an alleged fraudulent tenancy allocation. The Ombudsman cannot investigate this complaint. This is because this relates to the actions of a social housing landlord and the Ombudsman has no jurisdiction to investigate.
Summary: Miss X complained about the Council’s failure to give her transfer application correct priority for a general needs property. The Ombudsman cannot investigate this complaint. This is because she does not require an allocation under ‘reasonable preference’ and consequently the matter is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.
Summary: Miss X complained about the Council’s failure to give her transfer application correct priority. The Ombudsman cannot investigate this complaint. This is because she does not require an allocation under ‘reasonable preference’ and consequently the matter is not within the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.
Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Ms B’s complaint that, when reaching a decision on whether it owed a housing duty to her, the Council unlawfully discriminated against her. This is because it is reasonable to expect Ms B to use her review and county court rights if she wishes to challenge the Council’s new decision on her homelessness application and to complete the Council’s complaint process in respect of her complaint about the Council’s administrative actions.
Summary: The Ombudsman found fault with the Council’s failure to make a timely offer of accommodation to the complainant. This meant the complainant remained in unsuitable accommodation for longer than he should have. The Council has agreed to apologise to the complainant and pay a sum of financial recompense in recognition of the distress he suffered as a result.
Summary: The Ombudsman found fault on Mr Q’s complaint that the Council failed to take enforcement action when his landlord did not carry out works to his home required under Improvement Notices it served. There were long periods of delay and failures to keep Mr Q informed about progress. The Council agreed to send Mr Q an apology, carry out a review, contact the landlord and monitor progress, and pay Mr Q £300 for the impact of the delays.
We look at individual complaints about local public services and all registerable social care providers in England.
We remedy injustice and share learning from investigations to improve services. When we find a council or care provider has done something wrong, we recommend how it should put it right. We are free to use and make our decisions independently.
