Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s refusal to allow a 12-week property disregard when completing his father's financial assessment. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains about the Council’s refusal to allow a 12-week property disregard when completing his father’s financial assessment.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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 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

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X’s father needed care and support in a residential care home. In November 2022, Mr X contacted the Council to ask about financial support with the cost of this. A transcript of the phone call showed the advisor gave Mr X information about a deferred payment.
6. The advisor signposted Mr X to the Council’s website and explained full information about deferred payments and how they operated was available there. The advisor noted that the deferred payments was like a bridging loan where the Council would pay the care provider directly until the property was sold. The advisor also confirmed interest was payable and no other financial help was likely available. Mr X confirmed he would go read up on the information on the website.
7. In December 2022, Mr X contacted the Council again for support with Mr X’s care and support charges. The transcript of this phone call showed the discussion mainly centered around Mr X’s father’s capacity to decide his care and support arrangements. However, there was a brief discussion about Mr X’s father having a property and so the assumption would be that he was a self-funder. The advisor confirmed that if the property was not sold by the time Mr X’s father went into residential care, then Mr X could look at deferred payments. The advisor confirmed this was an agreement set up with the Council and that interest would be charged. The advisor also confirmed a financial assessment would be completed.
8. Mr X considers he was misinformed by the Council as he says the Council did not tell him about the 12-week property disregard period or about deferred payment agreements. Mr X says he thought the support offered was a short-term loan that would need to be settled within three months. Due to this, he made the decision to fund his father’s care placement himself, with the intention of paying himself back once his father’s property sold. Mr X became a permanent resident of a care home at the end of December 2022.
9. I have reviewed the information available on the Council’s website regarding deferred payment agreements. The website provides very clear information about what a deferred payment agreement was and how it worked.
10. The website also provided information about the 12- week property disregard and confirmed that for the first 12 weeks of permanent admission, the value of the main property is not considered. After 12 weeks, the value of the property would be included in the financial assessment and the individual would be assessed as having to pay the full cost of their residential care. An individual is then eligible for a deferred payment agreement if they have been assessed as having to pay the full cost of residential care but unable to pay due to capital being tied up in the property.
11. Further, the Council’s website confirmed that the cost would only need to be repaid when the house is sold, or within 90 days after the individual’s death.
12. The Council confirmed it would not apply a 12-week property disregard because this would only apply from the point Mr X’s father first became a permanent resident of a care home. This was December 2022. Therefore, the 12-week property disregard period ended March 2023 and was not something it would retrospectively apply.
13. An investigation is not justified as we are not likely to find fault. This is because it is clear the Council did provide Mr X with sufficient information about deferred payment agreements and what this entailed. The Council’s website, which Mr X was directly to review, also detailed the 12-week property disregard so Mr X would have been aware this period would be applied if Mr X was accepted as eligible for a deferred payment agreement. It was Mr X’s decision to proceed with funding his father’s placement himself.
14. Further, the care and support statutory guidance notes that councils must disregard the value of a person’s main home for 12 weeks when they first enter a care home as permanent resident. Therefore, the Council’s position is in line with the statutory guidance as the disregard period would have applied from the end of December 2022. There is also no requirement for the Council to retrospectively apply the period now that it has become involved with funding the placement.

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Final decision

15. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman