Possible outcomes
There are a number of possible decisions the Ombudsman might reach:
No fault
Our decision might be that there has been no fault by the council or care provider. For example, we may find that the body has followed the correct procedure in reaching a decision even though you disagree with it.
Insufficient injustice
We might decide that even if the council or care provider is at fault, the effect on you is not serious enough to justify continuing to investigate the complaint. For example, if the council charged you £5 for one photocopy and you thought this was too much, or if your meal in a care home was cold on one occasion.
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Local settlement
If we find that the council or care provider has done something wrong that has caused problems for you, we will often suggest to the body how it should put things right or resolve the complaint, and the body will agree. Or sometimes the body itself will make these suggestions. Either way we will take your views into account. If we think the result is fair, we will tell you so and stop our investigation. We call this a ‘local settlement.’ This may happen early on in the investigation when the body first responds to the complaint, or only after we have taken some of the steps described in How we will deal with your complaint.
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Report
Most decisions are made by letter, but sometimes the Ombudsman needs to write a formal report about your complaint if it is against a council. This could happen, for example, if the council does not agree to the suggested settlement or if the Ombudsman thinks the issue is of particular interest to the public. If so we will send you and the council a draft setting out the main facts and asking for any suggested changes or comments. Unless there are special reasons, the report will be made available to the public. It will not give your name. If we find that the council has been at fault and that you have suffered an injustice as a result, we will recommend what the council should do to put things right. We cannot make councils do what we recommend, but they almost always do so.
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Will the decision on my case be made public?
In some cases we may issue a public decision statement. Where we issue a formal report against a council (see above) we will make this public unless there are special reasons not to. We will not use your real name or those of any other people involved in any published report or decision statement.
Ombudsmen's investigations are required, by law, to be conducted in private. The law also says that information obtained by the Ombudsman during the course of an investigation must not be disclosed except for the purposes of the investigation, and for any report or decision statement.
This requirement not to disclose information obtained by us in the course of an investigation (other than anonymised information published by us) applies to the complainant and the body complained of. So you should not provide any information about your complaint obtained from us to the media, for example. This includes the real names of people anonymised in any report or decision statement.
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Date Updated: 20/10/11