Summary We will not investigate this complaint about a personal expenses allowance. There is not enough evidence of fault in how the Council came to its decision.

The complaint

1. Mrs Y complains, on behalf of Ms X, the Council overlooked certain essential expenses when it decided how much Ms X would pay towards her residential care. Mrs Y said this would put greatly impact Ms X’s finances and wants the Council to allow a discretionary uplift to Mrs X’s personal expenses allowance.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

2. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
3. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
4. I considered the Care and Support Statutory Guidance (“the Guidance”)

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My assessment

5. If a council has determined that a person’s needs should be met in residential care, it will assess how much the person can contribute towards the cost of their care. Paragraph 8.35 of the Guidance says that, in doing so, councils “must leave the person with a specified amount of their own income … to spend on personal items such as clothes and other items that are not part of their care. This is known as the personal expenses allowance (PEA). … Local authorities have discretion to apply a higher income allowance in individual cases, for example where the person needs to contribute towards the cost of maintaining their former home.”
6. The Council considered the request that it applies discretion to increase Mrs X’s PEA, to cover various expenses. The Council refused and explained its reasons for doing so. I am satisfied the Council addressed each expense, and considered its duties, the law, guidance and its policy. The Council also said that, for some expenses, it would reconsider its position if it saw supporting evidence. The Council has followed the correct process when making its decision, so an investigation is unlikely to find evidence of fault.
7. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the process an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong.

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Final decision

8. We will not investigate this complaint because it is unlikely that we would find evidence of fault.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman